I haven’t been able to write lately. Not because of writer’s block or a lack of something to say, but because I won’t allow myself to sit down and open the gates, letting the words pour out like water crashing down over the sharp edge of a waterfall. I can’t stomach the notion that these emotions that are drowning me every waking moment will be littered on the blankness of this page. I can’t stomach much these days. My stomach is an endless ball of tangled knots that tighten with each breath.

It could be denial. Maybe by doing the one true and comforting act of giving words to my feelings, they become concrete. Currently, these feelings are living only in my own body, in my bones and my far away eyes, in my coarse hair and nervous hands. Now, they will live infinitely on paper. They will live in other hearts as someone else’s eyes dance over them. Their realness is not escapable once this happens. I will be trapped in the here and now.

I can’t go on trudging through the box of memories in my mind and recreating moments where things fell apart. I have learned through this agony that there were so many tiny small moments that I now miss. Like grains of sand they slipped through the hourglass until our time was up, until we were left hollow and empty. Writing will require me to live in that emptiness. To reside in that space where nothing feels quite right. You laugh, you work, you make plans, you sleep and wake up, yet each day you crawl out of your skin. Your heart beats, yes, but no longer to the same rhythm.

This will also serve as a time machine, forever bringing me back to this moment. I look forward to the day I am out of this but these words on this page will always send me shooting back, like a bullet released from a pistol. I have ran to this page many times for comfort and ran away each time because of fear. I long to find that security I once felt from letting my fingers race along the keys. I long to feel anything real or familiar.

I know that familiar isn’t where I should be. The strange thing about all of this is that moving forward seems terrifying but moving backwards does too. The future is too far ahead and the past is forever gone and changed. I live in grey, between these two worlds. I hate the grey. I feel like a tree without any roots. I am in a car but not driving, I have no control or sense of what will be. That is the grey. It is the middle land, the space after an era ends. The space after a loved one is lost. The space where you want to sleep but your bed isn’t comfortable and you want to be around friends but once you’re there you can’t wait to be home.

I think the important thing about sadness is to respect it and feel its sharp corners. Let it rock you like a wave and wash over you. I don’t try to avoid any feelings, because without darkness the light isn’t as bright. Each day I pass through anger, sadness, confusion, laughter, numbness and happiness. I accept this. I don’t want to sleep away emotions or drown them in wine or crowds. I like to sit quietly with each of them, allowing them to shape me and push me forward.

I know this will not last forever. One day I will feel comfortable again. My heart will surface and the unknown won’t be as daunting. Writing will be my kind, old friend again. My computer will come out from where I have hid it and my smile will become genuine again. Until then though, I will continue waking up, breathing and thinking about the day when  it all feels good again.