Monday, 10 September 2012

An Insomniac's guide to missing.

The anatomy of missing starts with one odd piece, here and there. You can go on, slightly wonky, for a long time without realising it.
Until someone stops and asks you.

"Hey, you Scissorhands- you got a pair of XL shears?"

And you go all wide-eyed, goofy grin-

"You bet I do mate (or whatever lame form of greeting you use)".

Until you realize, you don't.
Your shears fell away, somewhere along the twisted, winding road.
Right.
Nothing is more acute than needing them, then. At that moment when someone reminds you of them. Reference to context.

Of course, there is 'even more acute', when you notice another person's shiny new shears. You used to have them. These shears. Together you would snip at life. Well, now you don't.

There are times when you can go on, for a long time, with large gaping chunks in you. Cashmere knits often cover those well. You look at people who are whole- and how simplistic do they look? Their lives are missing that certain sexy Sylvia Plath dimension, that yours took. You would work that, if only you could stop picking at your own gaping chunks, and muttering softly.
Always there is muttering softly.

Then, there is the kind of missing which occurs at night. It's needless, pointless and often just a ghost whisper. However, like the monsters under our beds and in our heads- nothing can seem more real, scary or urgent. Every attempt to fight it, is another moment you succumb to it. Alprax wasn't a coincidence, it was probably invented by some gentlemen with a past best forgotten.

Maybe when you really miss something.
Your grand mom.
An old love.
A pet
It's a collective scream. Parts of you, calling out.

Guys, we left that guy behind. He was one of us. Come on!  Let's go back for him.

And every time we don't turn around for that part of us, that XL shear, we're betraying ourselves. Or maybe we're scattering bit of ourselves around the world. Broken bits which never come back. Those are the bits of us which broke free, they found something to love, live for and represent. They perished with it.

And maybe, you're just a person with holes, desperate to find something to live for. To represent and perish with.

Maybe, that's when they will miss you too.

















Photo Credit: here

1 comment:

  1. I generally manage to muddle through your musings, and arrive somewhat wiser at the other end. This one left me more clueless than when I started.
    I could use some light, please?

    ReplyDelete