05.29.2007 - 11:27 a.m.

I�ve always been fascinated by what I can�t have. When I was little, I wanted to be a boy like my brother. I also could not even entertain the possibility that unicorns did not exist. In middle school it was a horse and popularity, or at least non-nerddom. In high school there was always some guy whose hold on my imagination was directly proportional to the obstacles that kept me from having him.

In college it was happiness, and more guys� the ones who were just friends, the ones who were taken, the ones who lived too far away. The one my boyfriend at the time really wanted to be, but couldn�t quite live up to.

After college, it�s been success. Confidence. Health. A novel with my name on it. Guys. Still.

I don�t know why I think of it as �can�t.� I could have any of those things, if they mattered enough to me. If I was willing to pay the price. But I set myself up for the fall. I don�t want what I could have. I don�t work for what I dream of. Half the time, I don�t mean what I dream anyway. I borrow my husband�s goals, or my mother�s, or I pretend I don�t have any. I decide I want something, then I play computer games instead of getting it. Good things and stupid ones, it�s all the same. A life without ambition drifts like a clump of suds in old dishwater. And I don�t even empty the sink during the week.

Am I making any sense?

I didn�t really sleep last night. I closed my eyes, opened them, and then my husband was getting ready to leave for work. Maybe that�s it.

But I�m pretty sure it�s more.

-stonebridge

previous | next