bunker

Just last week it hit you like a ton of bricks: this is why people take Xanax. You suddenly realized how frequently you’re filled with anxiety, and how much of the last four years you’ve spent feeling that way. You’ve become so used to keeping everything so bottled up here; you’ve forced yourself to be so tightly contained. There’s a tempest raging inside of you, but no one bears witness to it. If others only knew--how you’re screaming inside. Screaming. But no one hears, not even those closest to you, because you maintain such a good front. That’s always been your M.O. Keep up a good front, no matter what--until it finally collapses in on itself from the sheer weight of it. Some build fake exteriors of wood or tin. Not you. Yours is made from concrete and rebar. No one’s getting past that motherfucker. But damn, it’s heavy. And there’ve been a few earthquakes over the years that have reduced it to rubble. But FEMA’s got nothing’ on you, baby! You are the Rebuilding Queen!

But it’s not like you’ve spent your entire life hiding behind your fortified bunker. There’ve been moments, passages, when you’ve set it down and stepped in front of it. And oh, how light you felt in those moments. So very, very light. And you liked the feeling. Truly, you did. But the world is not to be trusted. Why must you keep learning that lesson over and over again? And how can you possibly be the person you were meant to be, and aspire to be, with all of that concrete blocking your view…and your light? Surely there’s a way. You keep trying to find that way, and sometimes you even get a glimpse of it. A moment, a shadow. You turn your head quickly because you’re sure you saw a fleeting image of it out of the corner of your eye. You know it’s there; you’re simply trying to get it front and center.

You told almost no one about ‘the prayer.’ Not because you were embarrassed by it, but because it scared you a little--that it might actually have been answered. You’re not one for any sort of organized religion, but you do try to keep hold of your own quirky brand of spirituality. You still don’t know what possessed you last Tuesday morning to offer up that prayer. Because that’s what it felt like--an offering. Sometimes praying feels to you like pleading. But this time, you simply offered it up.

You were in the car and had just pulled away from the condo. You flipped off the radio. You always listen to the radio during your morning commute, but you were craving quiet. You went up the little rise and back down again, went behind the restaurant and through the guard gate. It was as you drove up the little slope that leads to the main road--it was in that moment that you heard yourself offering up that prayer. It surprised you, because you hadn’t been feeling depressed or even out of sorts really. But you heard yourself say that you needed a sign. That you were feeling a bit lost--like you weren’t sure which direction to head. You didn’t know what your purpose is in this life, and how best to serve that purpose. You didn’t even know where to go to begin to find it. Should you stay here? Should you go? If you should go, where should you go? You heard yourself ask for a sign and you promised that if you got one, you’d pay attention to it. Twenty-four hours later, you got it--the email from your landlord telling you that you have to move. But how could that be? You’d only just asked for a sign the day before. Could this be it? You know that it could, and that it was. But this time there was no earthquake. This time it was easy on you. Your bunker wasn’t reduced to rubble. Instead you quietly set it down…and began beating the shit out of it with a sledgehammer.