How am I supposed to fall in love if I am stuck behind this counter all day?
How am I to watch late autumnal leaves scatter and dance in gutters? They’ll only do that once this year and here I am, inside with no view of the sky. No glimmer of it.
How am I to observe two strangers passing as strangers for the last time?
How am I to retrace the natural steps of those who have come before me when I am of the generation where saying hello is too intimate and reading is a luxury no one has time for?
How am I to learn of the land when no one tells stories of it anymore?
How am I to feel human, remain grounded, generous, and understanding when I am forced to be robotic? Forced to keep a smile, hold tension in my cheeks and be pleasant even when it contradicts my integrity.
When the hours the sun is high in the sky and I cannot feel it on my skin, how am I to hear what it is saying? How am I to make sense of it?
How am I to pay my bills, the ones that keep skyrocketing, buy the block of land I so badly dream of and still live a life of bought luxuries if I don’t subject myself to the grind of customer service for the foreseeable future?
If I quit tomorrow, how am I to be of value to society, to my future family, if I offer no monetary benefits? How can one exchange words, prose and melody into food on the table without turning passion into a chore?
How am I to truly know my internal worth if it all boils down to dollars and cents? Is that the conditioning in my head? I’m certain I am far more interesting than any amount of money in my account could ever be.
Yet, I worry.
How am I to say no to the customer asking for something beyond my means? How am I to say yes to myself when I am asking of something well within my means?
A day off. A long walk. A nap in the afternoon sun. Time alone to bask in my own company.
How am I to block out the nonsense, flush out the toxins, when it is everywhere in everything?
How am I to simply exist when the world asks more of me than I could ever give.
