Journal

Whenever I have strong feelings, I write in my journal. I like to write in cursive because it’s my only opportunity to practice it. However, it’s 1:24 AM on a night that I need to wake up early, so I seriously do not have the energy to find my journal, find a pen, and write for an hour. As a result, I’m typing on Pages; it feels more real than the notes app, and I chose a nice font to make it seem more authentic— I don’t know. Attempts to make this journal feel more authentic are failing so I suppose I should just start:

I have a hard time trusting. I don’t entirely know why that is, maybe it’s my own fault and I keep putting myself into situations where I get hurt and confused. Even as an openly vulnerable and emotional person, trust is entire new kind of vulnerability. Like flowers, sometimes they blossom without you even noticing— between cracks in the sidewalk or in corners of your backyard you didn’t even notice; trusting your family or childhood friends. This kind of trust is like the flowers you plant yourself. You have to go through all this effort to make it happen, sprout and soil and water and tend. And you watch it. Every single day. And growth is inescapably slow. I watch this flower grow before me and I know it will bloom because that’s what I believe will happen— it’s what I’m told will happen. Still, I sit here with my head rested on the window seal watching this stupid plant grow and I’m not even sure if it will. 

And what if I bought the wrong seeds? What am I supposed to do when what I thought was a hydrangea is really just a shrub that I’ve been caring for. I’m grateful for the shrub— it’s still nice, and it’s taught me so much about taking care of plants— but what about me? I spent all my time and energy watching it grow into something I don’t even want. When I think about us, its now a third person perspective. I’m not the flower. I’m not the water. I’m not the sun. I’m not the soil, the nutrients you need to grow. We are the flower. 

I watch as we take our time, developing with the world around us. And as a gardener, I know things take time but I really wish I was sure we would bloom but honestly I don’t know. And you don’t either.

It means nothing to cry in front of you. It means everything to hold that belief that you’ll always be there to cry in front of. I ramble and I rant but it’s only because I don’t know how many words I have left till my timer is up and your coat is on. As my sentences grow shorter, I know now that I’ve lost you and there’s no longer a point to all of this. 

Everything I want is so far away from me, an unrequited promise. People always compare their dreams to stars, reaching out but not able to touch. Mine is the girl in the mirror who I’ll never be able to hug— I’ll never be able to hold her hand and braid her hair and tell her upfront, “it’ll be okay”. All it takes is a shifted mindset and she’s here, yet I am so consciously disoriented. I rest my hand on the mirror, the closest I’ll get to holding hers. But all that does is leave a smudge for me to clean later. 

But really, you’re not a flower and you’re not the girl in the mirror. You’re you and you are the thought of a deep breath when I’m hundreds of feet underwater. I can’t wait, I flail my arms and legs reaching for the break but water is dense and I’m bad at swimming. In truth, there’s nothing I can do but shift my mindset.  

So why am I here writing about metaphors when all it takes is to rearrange my thoughts? I don’t know. I’m actually blanking trying to come up with how to answer my own question. Documenting how I feel, my mind avoids the question so meticulously that now I’m noticing I can see my own eyelashes, and now I’m concerned about the time, and now I realize how cold my feet are. I think I’m just afraid of facing how I feel. It’s easier to sink into a feeling of sadness because as much as literature and media tries to paint sorrow as this horrible, miserable feeling— it feels euphoric to be sad. This might be an individual feeling, but I like to stick to the notion that there’s no such thing as an original thought. It feels beautiful to cry. I enjoy feeling my fingertips tingle, as my breathing slows and blood doesn’t circulate as well as it does normally— when I feel those sharp shiver in my sinus that tells my eyes to turn on the waterworks. Sobbing is the ugliest beautiful sight. 

I have more to say but I think I have to pause now. July 9, 2025 2:10 AM. Goodnight.