life is a garden ➿ and the roots are all touching
things i do not ask for
Sometimes I forget about what my whole thing is. My whole thing is to, like, ease suffering and make this world a less lonely place or whatever. To love. Sometimes I just get all in my squishy ol’ head about shit that doesn’t even matter.
I tell B that I am avoidant which feels like an epiphany but instead of being surprised she just laughs like okay, we all already knew that. Apparently everyone else knows me better than I know myself. WTFDYM.
I tell her I want to change but I don’t know how. I tell her I am a scared child. I tell her I love like a father. She says to be a better father than the ones I had, to love like the father I want. I don’t know what to say. I am a scared child. I start by squeezing my own head between my hands. B holds my hand and pays for lunch. She gives me things I do not ask for.
[I shuffle around, clutch my chest, groan in agony. I am suffering, make it a bit, like a monkey with cymbals, dancing in a jazz square. Muttering under my breath. Jester’s privilege, jester’s privilege, jester’s privilege, rrrrgghhhhhhhhhggghghghghgh.]
Sometimes I forget what my whole thing is. I really do. Sometimes I just get lost in the sauce of life and I’m swimming in it, Ketchup to mustard to aioli, meeting to job to studio.
A is my best friend of over a decade and she asks me what I want to do for my thirtieth fucking birthday and I almost knock my beertini over. I almost knock over my beertini full of three just-alright olives and fucking scream silently like that one German painting I can’t fucking remember the name of right now. I pause and drink my beertini full of Narragansett and brine. I think about a beertini made of all the tears repressed and constipated in my ducts. Sounds fucking gross, I would not drink that.
A is beautiful. She has grown to become so beautiful, even more beautiful than she already was when we met. She is so beautiful and she makes time for me. She is so beautiful and treats me to my beertini. She gives me things I do not ask for.
[Flopping like a fish trying to break free at the wet market, I am on the floor, feeling so smelly and slimy. If I lay here… If I just lay here…]
My father loves me from a distance. Another father loves me with words. What he lacks in action he makes up for tenfold in sincerity, all with the understanding that I cannot ask for more than he gives. He does not give me enough and I accept this. I accept this because I know nothing else. I accept this because I am afraid. I am afraid to ask for things. Please do not leave again, please stay far away. I do not ask for things.
[A dog jumps into my lap and looks at me, determined and enthusiastic. She allows me to pet, to speak with her. She reveals her belly to me.]
I walk thirty minutes from the train to my apartment because fuck-it-I-don’t-know, I don’t know what to do with myself right now. It is pitch black and the Sabrina Carpenter playing through my wired headphones feels stupid for more reasons than one. I cannot stop thinking about someone jumping out from the bushes and stabbing me. I know I shouldn’t think about those things but can you imagine how terrible that would be!
[You and I are earth.]
The other day I said aloud that I’d rather die than to admit to the thing I’ve been gripping like little marbles in my hands, and B rolls her eyes. As her mouth begins to move, I say,
I know I know I know, I tell her.
I know.
I need to change. I just don’t know how. I am afraid to ask for things.
Sometimes I forget about what my whole thing is. My whole thing is to, like, ease suffering and make this world a less lonely place or whatever. To love. Sometimes I just get all in my squishy ol’ head about shit that doesn’t even matter.
I tell B that I am avoidant which feels like an epiphany but instead of being surprised she just laughs like okay, we all already knew that. Apparently everyone else knows me better than I know myself. WTFDYM.
I tell her I want to change but I don’t know how. I tell her I am a scared child. I tell her I love like a father. She says to be a better father than the ones I had, to love like the father I want. I don’t know what to say. I am a scared child. I start by squeezing my own head between my hands. B holds my hand and pays for lunch. She gives me things I do not ask for.
[I shuffle around, clutch my chest, groan in agony. I am suffering, make it a bit, like a monkey with cymbals, dancing in a jazz square. Muttering under my breath. Jester’s privilege, jester’s privilege, jester’s privilege, rrrrgghhhhhhhhhggghghghghgh.]
Sometimes I forget what my whole thing is. I really do. Sometimes I just get lost in the sauce of life and I’m swimming in it, Ketchup to mustard to aioli, meeting to job to studio.
A is my best friend of over a decade and she asks me what I want to do for my thirtieth fucking birthday and I almost knock my beertini over. I almost knock over my beertini full of three just-alright olives and fucking scream silently like that one German painting I can’t fucking remember the name of right now. I pause and drink my beertini full of Narragansett and brine. I think about a beertini made of all the tears repressed and constipated in my ducts. Sounds fucking gross, I would not drink that.
A is beautiful. She has grown to become so beautiful, even more beautiful than she already was when we met. She is so beautiful and she makes time for me. She is so beautiful and treats me to my beertini. She gives me things I do not ask for.
[Flopping like a fish trying to break free at the wet market, I am on the floor, feeling so smelly and slimy. If I lay here… If I just lay here…]
My father loves me from a distance. Another father loves me with words. What he lacks in action he makes up for tenfold in sincerity, all with the understanding that I cannot ask for more than he gives. He does not give me enough and I accept this. I accept this because I know nothing else. I accept this because I am afraid. I am afraid to ask for things. Please do not leave again, please stay far away. I do not ask for things.
[A dog jumps into my lap and looks at me, determined and enthusiastic. She allows me to pet, to speak with her. She reveals her belly to me.]
I walk thirty minutes from the train to my apartment because fuck-it-I-don’t-know, I don’t know what to do with myself right now. It is pitch black and the Sabrina Carpenter playing through my wired headphones feels stupid for more reasons than one. I cannot stop thinking about someone jumping out from the bushes and stabbing me. I know I shouldn’t think about those things but can you imagine how terrible that would be!
[You and I are earth.]
The other day I said aloud that I’d rather die than to admit to the thing I’ve been gripping like little marbles in my hands, and B rolls her eyes. As her mouth begins to move, I say,
I know I know I know, I tell her.
I know.
I need to change. I just don’t know how. I am afraid to ask for things.
last edited 11/14/25