I'm afraid of being to afraid to think. And for good reason. I've read too much George Orwell to not be afraid of a fear of thought. Lucky for me, I don't think I'm afraid of thinking- I think I don't want to think simply because thinking is harder than not thinking. I just chose the easier path. The more I think about that choice, the more I feel as though George Orwell may be disappointed. Maybe it's not fearing thought, but not thinking at all is just the problem. But it's too hard to feel disappointed, and it's even harder to feel I've disappointed another, so I just won't think about that.

If I wanted to, I would.

But if I didn't want to, would that be just as bad?

I keep thinking of ways to kill children. It didn't really start until I had my own.

Suddenly, there I was, thinking, Look at this--small enough for him to put it into his little innocent mouth while no one's looking. He could choke! And, My God, turn the pot handle in toward the hot stove. Little hands could reach up and pull the boiling grease all over her. And, Should I put up some type of fence barrier thing on the railing of the balcony? They'll climb it. Of course they will, and one will push the other, and one would start to fall, and he would grab at her on the way down, and they both would fall to their little senseless deaths.

Once you have children, you begin to realize the worst possible thing that could befall a parent in this life. You're keen to inspect the floors. You smell for trouble. Your imagination begins to construct entire scripts in which the young, feckless, and clueless come up against the laws of physics, which are unyielding, and these children will get severely injured or die.

It's terrible, this monster I've become. Every object is scrutinized for the perfect tracheal diameter. Every sharp object is seen as something a child could run with. Little bodies don't like extra holes, unless it's a tube put in for ear infections. And it is exhausting to consider all of the things that could put out an eye. I don't know them all, but I think of new ones every day.

I sand without eye protection, but the little shitling better not even be in the same room.

Just how well do we trust that old dog of ours? Is cat scratch fever really a thing? Let them play outside--really? Are you out of your fucking mind! Is that just some rash or the harbinger of Neisseria meningitis? Another cold--that's two this year--leukemia? diabetes? How do I know this liquid Tylenol hasn't been...yea, that's right...tampered with?

When I'm stopped in traffic under an overpass, I back up a couple of inches so the falling girder will crush me instead of the kids in the back. What's in that aromatherapy machine I smell in Grandma's machine? Eucalyptus? Peppermint? Wintergreen? That stuff can kill them, for God's sake!

Are those vitamins really necessary? What about hypervitaminoses? Did you even think about that?

Yep, just when I think I know all the weird ways to kill a child, a new one stuns me back into the sobriety of mortality. How do I think of these things? Was I a child-killer in a previous life? Or has evolution given my children this survival advantage?

My kids are grown. They survived. And if I so much as catch any of 'em with a cigarette, I'll kill 'em.

Toxic, yes. Stupid, no.

she was the girl who told everybody

to hold on to hope

while she hid in her bedroom

at night and cut herself

She’d pass the razor blade

by the side

of her ankles

and then crouch so as to lick

and slurp

the blood

swirl it around her mouth

until it lost its salty, iron taste

and then swallow

She always wore pants

never a skirt

and she was the girl who

told everybody to hold on to hope

until the last moment

She would climb on the roof

and smoke menthol cigarettes while

watching the stars in the sky

and slowly, slowly drift into touching

herself

I don’t even know her name

but I would like to

ask her

to be my muse

***

INSTAGRAM:

https://www.instagram.com/bogdan_1_dragos/

I’m reading a book about a woman who travels. She’s the opposite of me. She has lived in seemingly a thousand different places and seen parts of the globe that I’ve never even imagined visiting.

She frames it as a wild journey, running from place to place to place to place for decades. A desperate fleeing of her circumstances, the endless search for self.

I am jealous. I burn with envy that she is witty and articulate and has a passport and friends whom she can visit, dipping in and out of their lives on a whim.

But she only sees what she doesn’t have: a partner or a husband, her name on a mortgage. She frames herself as immature, an object of pity. How odd she is to be couch surfing at her age, when everyone else has settled down, moved into the trappings of adulthood, has stopped the childish wandering.

And I am stuck. Sitting at my dining room table to devour her book while slumped on a half-broken hand-me-down chair. A chair that was purchased to fulfill someone else’s taste. A chair I cannot afford to replace, and so I have to ignore how ugly it is, how useless.

I’m stuck in the city of my childhood.

I have never had the opportunity to leave, except for a brief stint teaching English overseas.

It was always intended to be temporary, a fling of adventure between graduating from university and getting married. A five-month ordeal of undiagnosed depression and anxiety and drinking too much alcohol. A torturous winter of sleeping for fourteen hours a day and not speaking to anyone for days, feeling out of place because I am at least three years older than everyone else in the program, and in your early twenties that makes a big difference. A blur of homesickness and temporary insanity and getting punched in the face one night when a man tries to mug my friend. I recognize that his pistol is fake, so I try to push him into traffic and he hits me, landing a solid hook to my right cheek and leaving a dent that you can still see today when I scrunch my cheeks up to smile.

But I have never had the option to live anywhere but here. Locked into staying in my hometown at eighteen, forbidden from applying to colleges outside of my city due to financial constraints and the iron will of my widowed mother who raised four teenagers by herself.

And now that I’m forty-three and middle aged I wonder if maybe I should have just run away from home after high school? Run off to New York City where things actually happen to people? Where life gets lived?

But I couldn’t. I didn’t.

By the time I was eighteen I had a boyfriend I loved, and I knew even then that he was a kind man and would be a good husband and father. And so I stayed, locked into my small little life, dreaming of moving away to anywhere else, jealous of everyone I knew who got to “go away to college” and live their own lives. I thought I would get a chance later.

And now it’s too late. I have children and pets, my name on a mortgage, elderly mothers (my own and my husband’s) who rely on us for companionship and help and stability. I can’t just pull up stakes and abandon everyone. But neither can I capriciously take a job across state lines and move my entire family on a whim. I am stuck.

And so I read this lady’s book, fear and jealousy and heartbreak churning in my gut. Glad for her when she finally settles down, finds a house of her own in a city that she loves, feels her roots growing and the calm of middle age settling in… she gets her happy ending.

What if I am well and truly stuck here? What if the furthest I ever travel for the rest of my life is Dallas? What happens to me if I die in this city, never having truly lived a life of my choosing? What, if anything, changes for me?

I don’t want to contemplate that question, because it hurts to think about, but the answer surprises me… nothing. Nothing will change.

I will still love my children and cook dinner and read library books and knit. But most of all I will still write. I’ll still burn inside each day until I get the words out.

Maybe traveling the world isn’t a prerequisite for being a good writer.

Maybe I’m not missing anything at all.

Maybe I should bloom where I’ve been planted, instead of feeling rootbound and resentful.

Maybe I’m just fine. Maybe…

If you ask everyone on their deathbeds about their regrets, you will hear the predictable whining:

I wish I hadn't worked so much and spent time with my family.

I wish I hadn't put my education ahead of my life experiences.

I wish I had put all my loved ones ahead of money, ambition, etc.

I wish I had listened to my loved ones.

The truth is, the ones who die with family and loved ones around their deathbeds are the ones who don't regret anything, for they obviously didn't put work, education, ambition, etc., ahead of their loved ones. And they listened when loved ones advised them on mid-course corrections.

Their loved ones had been with them the whole time...

...all the way to the very end. That's a life without regrets.

Do you want to count your money on your deathbed? Your sexual conquests? Your Rolexes? All those whom you bested? No, the only thing you want to count are the ones who wanted to be with you at the very end.

We should teach our children to live lives that make life worth living. That means incorporating the human factor into every relationship, every decision, and every journey. It means goodness doesn't have to profit us tangibly because goodness is its own reward.

Dying peacefully, alone, is not peaceful dying. Dying mattering to the ones you love is a great way to go. We should teach our children that the end justifies the means.

To you who put yourselves through the horror of reading any of my posts, first of all, I'm sorry. More importantly, if you see an error--grammatical, syntax, spelling, or otherwise--please make a note of it in the comments. Don't worry about typos. I'm talking about mistakes that are likely to be repeated, like when I say lay when it should be lie.

Since I was a wee puke, I've always been intrigued and motivated by my mistakes, but if no one ever points it out, I'll likely never learn. So please, have at it.

Proofreading is a mad skill, but that's not really what's needed here, unless it's something we're considering submitting for publishing. For instance, we all know the difference between there and their, but when you're in the thick of the fight, writing feverishly trying to fill water cups from a fire hydrant, sometimes the fingers just go their own way. How many times have you reread and thought, "Whaaaaat??" Just the other day I found Your instead of You're. Whaaaaat??

Most of the stuff we submit daily probably doesn't require proofreading--we get the point, and we all make mistakes. Irregardless, however--that's something that needs to be dealt with before it spreads. Why isn't irregardless being automatically underlined in red as a misspelled word? Is that a thing now? Dammit!

I'm just saying, you have my permission to point things out. I want to improve as a writer, and I know I don't know all the rules yet, so feel free to educate me when the opportunity arises.

If you leave a comment asking for the same treatment, who knows? Maybe we'll get good at this stuff.

the days follow

each other

like ants

towards a dead

thing

and after enough of

them pass

by,

you

finally realize you

are that dead thing

And that's supposed to

be alright. After

all, no one is

excused from this

All we can

do is make the journey

pleasant

However,

when the alarm wakes you

up at

6:30 in the morning,

announcing that there's

yet another day

in which you'll have to attend

your duties of

slaving away for others to

get rich,

when you're slipping

into the other

half of your life

not bringing along any

fulfilled dreams

despite trying again and

again...

Another day

in which you'll be assaulted

by questions

like,

"Hey, so when are you

going to get married?"

"Have you even

someone to marry?"

"Why don't you

get another job? Aren't you a bit

too old for this one?"

"How much do

they pay you?"

"Are you ready for your

cousin's wedding?

Oh, and then there's

the wedding of

this other cousin. Wow, lots

of weddings lately. What

about you?"

Slowly,

old friends become

mere acquaintances

and finally

strangers

and you just regret

that family can't

quite follow the same pattern

They say that if you're

the smartest person

in the room

you're in the wrong room

But what do they

have to say

when you're the most

unfulfilled person in

the room?

They'd probably ask

how the fuck

you got like that

You probably don't

even know

anymore

probably don't

care

You just watch

the ants follow

each other

on the trail to the dead thing

and the closer they

get

the more you

urge them

to hurry the fuck up,

stupid creatures

You just wanna give 'em

a hand.

Bring the dead thing

to them

Throw it on

top of them

***

INSTAGRAM:

https://www.instagram.com/bogdan_1_dragos/

AUDIO READING HERE:

https://soundcloud.com/user-937736610/like-ants-crawling-up-to-a-dead-thing

She doesn't want to see

people

on the weekend

only her

cat

She gets drunk by herself

and then rummages through

her books

and reads the last pages

of several romance novels

and starts crying

When she cries

she holds the

cat's head like

a goblet

and clasps its ears with

her lips

and sucks on them,

making the poor

animal uncomfortable

And if the cat

runs away

she gets really sad

She writes positive

affirmations on

pieces of paper she

rips from

books

GOD IS MY SUPPLY OF LOVE

IN GOD'S NAME, I AM LOVE

THERE IS ONLY LOVE

LOVING ITSELF

AND THAT'S ALL THERE IS

then she eats the

papers

or crumples and

shoves them

deep between her

legs,

strengthening her faith

in the power of

the word

eventually she

falls asleep

and dreams of an

umbilical cord floating

through space,

seeking to wrap itself

around a planet shaped as

a baby's head,

wanting to strangle, to

crush it

but it never

succeeds

Eventually she awakens

and starts

writing poems

***

INSTAGRAM:

https://www.instagram.com/bogdan_1_dragos/

the maggots are never

dirty

even though they

live in

filth

their whiteness

remains

immaculate somehow

They reach out and

emerge

wiggling from the

rotten flesh. Either

searching for

the meaning of

life

or offering an answer

to it

It was hard to decide

watching

them from above

but the younger the

eye, the blinder

to reality

“I like this one,” said

the little girl,

touching and caressing

the back of one

not much slimmer than

her finger. “I think I'll name

him Bread. I like

bread.”

“Me too,” said the boy. “And

I like... this

one.” He pointed at another

just as big. I'll name

her... Mother. Because

I miss her.”

“Oh, me too.”

“She told us that a day

will come

when we'll have to be

the ones

taking care of her.”

“Oh, but when will

that day come?”

“I don't know. Maybe when

she gets back

home.”

“It's been so long.”

“Yeah...”

“What do we do until then? The

white fairies have

taken over

all our food.”

“They're still our friends.

And guests.”

“I just wish

mother was here to see

them.”

“She'll be back.”

“What do we do until

then?”

The little boy had no

answer.

There was nothing else to

do but hold on

to the diseased hands

of time

and keep on dreaming

They were simply too

good at it

***

INSTAGRAM:

https://www.instagram.com/bogdan_1_dragos/