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Sometimes I feel like I’ve used up all my second chances. From you, from the universe. I’m honestly not sure why I’m still here. Do you believe in sixtieth chances?

There’s a circle of life, and a circle to life, and mine seems particularly small, or else I just travel it too fast. Around and around, loopity loopity loop. I take a hardship to dumb luck and loop back again. Loopity loopity loop. (I’m sick again, I’m better now, something is happening, something is always happening, how do I sleep through it, I’m not sleeping, I do sleep but it’s more like nightmaring.)

One time I dreamed I peeled the moon, and she looked like a kernel, and I looked too closely at her, and she popped.

Don’t look too close.

Under all these crater-scars and borrowed lights, I’m just a piece of something cut off from the husk of it.

Don’t look too close.

I’m afraid I’ll pop. I’m afraid my roots are too Eastern for any of this Western medicine to stick. I’m afraid I’m too felon-chained to navigate freedom. I’m afraid I’m too redundant to move towards a better plot. I’m afraid, I’m afraid, I’m afraid. Loop.

A good story is more of a spiral than a loop. Something worth listening to, something that makes more sense than “I couldn’t get out of bed today”…

Somedays, I can’t get out of bed.

Recently, I got back my right to vote. Today I found out my hip has healed very well. Sometime this week, I shook so hard from a panic attack, my rings slipped off my fingers and clanged on the floor like handcuffs sliding free.

Everyone says to take time for yourself until it’s their birthday party you’re missing, their text you’re hiding from. Everyone says to be authentic until the moon gets naked and isn’t a moon after all. Until she’s just one more thing that goes to work, and wears a suit, and hopes it doesn’t let the outside change it until the day it does. Pop.

Sometimes I sit on an orange couch, and pretend it is a sunset. I wear my unpeeled moon like a fancy dress, and I know I am just an earthy thing, a common thing, a small thing compared to what I once was. And, equally, I know I can be all the light my dark needs. I am so happy there, so full of joy to be seen as popcorn light. A now-self and potential-self and past-self, all at once.

I smile and I shine there, between the light and dark, on the orange sunset that doesn’t need a moon-shaped thing but welcomes me anyway.

I slow my orbit for a minute, or a day. Or has it been three days, or four? This is where my problems start, even when I’m glowing.

I have no sense of time now. I signed it away to sit in a cell, once upon a time. A signature of loops, a life of redundancy. You already know this fairy tale. You’ve seen this soap opera. It’s boring now, so I’ll circle it on my own and hope you don’t notice the days that pass in a blink.

One blink if you’re just going through the motions.
Two blinks if you’re fully here.

God never blinks, and so I don’t know for sure if He’s here anymore. I don’t know if He knows I can be a light if He never sees the dark.

But you’re here and I’m ignoring your call because I tried to wash a quarter yesterday and cried my eyes out, missing my late husband. You’re here, and are rooting for me, but I keep floating away from the safe tangles of your branches.

You’re here. And you were here for that second chance, because you believe in them, and me.

The phone rings again and I don’t know what to say, so I let it keep ringing. A beautiful ring, another one to shake, another loop to take.

I’m sorry I need so many loops. I’m sorry I go so fast through chances. I’m sorry I can’t blink twice right now. I’m sorry I miss you. I’m sorry I missed you.

I’m sorry I can’t come to the phone right now.

Leave a message, and I’ll return to you on my next go around.

Leave a message… if you believe in sixtieth chances.

53 thoughts on “leave a message”

  3. I always try to express my empathy for what you’re feeling, and the words aren’t enough, so I delete them. So here’s what I’m thinking: 💙😍💩🤔🤯😢☹️📞📞📞 and of course 🐢.

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  4. Hey…when we are talking about ourselves…there are endless chances! My whole blog is about chances….and the wrong decisions and all the times I kept trying to get things right. We are all “trying”. Some days it’s easier than others. If people don’t understand that, they aren’t worth worrying about anyway. You hang in there…that’s what we are all doing! 🤗hugs🤗

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  10. You know I love you, and you know that I could have written this myself.

    I know. You know. We both know that we know. We’ll always pick right back up where we left the conversation. No hard feelings, butthurt, or score keeping. Sometimes we are in a cocoon more than being a bright butterfly as a form of self care.

    Life is full of too much pressure and supposed expectations already. Genuine friendships shouldn’t be.

    💜 🦋

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  11. I believe in 60th chances. For you. For me. For everyone. We get as many chances as we need. All anyone can do is hang on for the ride. Right now I’m hanging on real tight afraid if I don’t I’ll go flying into oblivion. It gets easier if that’s any consolation. You’re probably stronger than you think. You don’t have to save the world, or be there for other people. Just sink into what’s needed for you, even if it means you can’t get out of bed. Bed’s a fine place to be. Stay as long as you need to.
    Alison xoxox

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  14. Hello love… I read this today before your post and it’s so perfect for this. From the exquisite Rebecca Campbell: “I release all old soul stories, vows, contracts and patterns that are no longer aligned with who I came here to be in present time. I carry the lessons, growth and gifts, but I choose to no longer live the same story. May I be unbound, unbound, forever unbound.”

    xo You can break through this. I know you can. You can sit in your fear for awhile and then you can stand up and pray for the ability to overcome it. We are hear for you – we will always be. Love you.

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  18. I can relate oh too well to your saga. Time has left me many moons ago and I often have no clue why I am even living on this planet. But connection eases me dis-ease. So glad you are still living here so we can leave a message – or not – together. ❤

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  19. No branches, no tangles, just glitter and *twinklysparkliness*

    You’re loopy.

    It’s okay; all the best people are.

    Or all the people who’ve had to deal to the point of overwhelm with all the things, and somehow have the brain-space to contain not only those and every perspective and context around them, but the stuff of further off, too, until you probably do feel as if you’d like to just *pop*

    I still love your brain xx

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  20. Ra, I’m not going anywhere. I’m always going to be here when you want someone to remind you that you are loved. Every single bit of you. The scars, the bumpy bits, the anxious bits, the depressed bits, the grieving bits, the happy bits, the sad bits, the there’s-not-enough-ice-cream-or-chocolate-in-the-world-to-cure-this bits. You are beautiful, and you are loved, and always will be.

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  21. When my sister & I were down or going through some sort of trial, we’d send this to each other:

    Since you are my sister as well, it seems fitting to place here for now. 💓
    “Nothing is broken. Least of all you.”
    Even though I know it may invoke a tear or two
    I’m going to keep saying it
    Until you know it’s true.
    🌹

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  25. Phrogmom said that they were sure that a lot of people were hanging on by a thread these days… Honestly, I think I’m hanging on by a strand of fiber that the thread is made up of and that’s beginning to unravel… BUT I’m still hanging on! So, I have to believe in infinite chances because I need them also. I have to believe that the people who matter will be kind and understanding, because this whole existing thing is hard, and the rules seem to change every time you think you’ve got it almost figured out and we’re all doing the best we can. ❤️
    Also, thud. 💚💜💙

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  27. I’m wondering if it would help to make ouselves number-blind, number-dyslectic, if there is such a thing in our life loops. The line between loops and spirals is fine, very, very fine. Also a loop has (is!) a movement. Now and then a tiny, unexpected breeze, and you get to see the spiral that is hidden in there. I don’t know if this makes any sense, but… Blink, blink. ❤

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  28. Grief and trauma… not able to string words together, to articulate simple thoughts, to even speak, grabbing the wrong words or sounds. I get it. How can you answer the phone or respond to messages when you’re so overwhelmed.

    Glad to hear that your hip healed and that you again have the right to vote. Much love.

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  31. This is captivating. Also very yellow. Like, I know this won’t make sense, but you, your writing, it’s yellow. Not the artsy yellow or the bright yellow but an Earth Yellow and it’s pure and it’s true and it’s unparalleled. Either way, really cool writing. 💛

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  32. Loops? Links in the chain of life. Sometimes the chain lies in a pile, but sometimes it stretches to infinity. Remember, van Gogh had problems – you have friends.

    BTW, the second photo below (rose and white petals) is the one I mentioned yesterday (my memory is colorblind).

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  33. Sorry I’m late. Been going through some crap myself. Only love sweet Ra. I don’t know how you manage to keep up with your life….I get tired just watching from afar. 🙂 I only know that I feel blessed whenever you are able to sprinkle some of your sunshine on me. One day soon I hope to get to sprinkle some sunshine for you too. I am so happy you can vote again. It’s such an important right. I’m glad you got it back. We get together with a few of our like minded friends to go over the ballot measures and candidates. It is much more fun to do with friends. It’s not so overwhelming. We take turns google searching for information. It is difficult these days to be an informed voter. We just had our little get together and it was a fun time, and now our sample ballots are ready to roll on election day. May the odds be ever in our favor. Hang in there sweet Ra. Hugs…Dani

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  35. Second chances? Sixtieth chances? The first chance was never lost, it’s simply a new moon which is the old moon seen again in time.

    I don’t devote enough time to this space. Not only reading your blog but also others’ blogs whose notifications still pile up in my inbox, unclicked and unread. If second chances or even sixtieth chances are needed, I always hope you’ll extend them to me. Like the moon, absence doesn’t mean I’m not present.

    I think I’m getting caught in moon metaphors. Hugs. Stars. Thud. xx

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