Exhale

A day unravels in mental illness, in useless circles around well-trodden paths, I am so many more questions than there could possibly be answers for, and it's hard to know if this is the right path when they all look knotted in the beginning. Meander over to the bar with more gritted teeth than faith but whatever gets you there is a good start. The bartender's boyfriend shows up later than usual, but her voice rises in octaves and they steal sweet moments at the edge of your vision. You turn your phone off, try to forget there's a real world where the rent needs paying. Illness has kept you sober for too long, the beer tastes different, it wraps you in a cotton cloud of your own anxietey. The real world agrees to sit back for a minute.

And that is when it happens. When the typewriter keys melt under your fingertips, when stories line up behind your eyelids, do you know I saw a character break and it made me cry despite myself, despite this chatty bar and dissuading beer, I saw her break and I did not. I stayed, right here, and carried her through and suddenly the hours had swept from under me, suddenly the world had floated away and there was only this story, only this dark wood of creative bliss and I never wanted to leave.

When I came up for air, at last, wiping the tears and trying to smooth the hair from my mad science, I had forgotten the questions that bore into me before. I forget the fear, the years that escape me, the rent that requires paying. This path is the right one. I know because it is the one that knows me in return. I know, because as much as I think I'm the one choosing the path, the path chooses you.

All you have to do is walk it.