thereβs a song I listen to when I know Iβm truly fucked when I know I have feelings for someone when I get that sinking wave of romance in my gut that makes me want to vomit and swim in an ocean of anxiety and like the sentimental poet that I am I wonβt tell you what that song is but Iβll give you a hint itβs the cover of a 70βs love song by Will to the Power
always second choice, a lifetime full of heather moments the universe makes a mockery out of me putting me in contests I never win never being smart enough, pretty enough, American enough will I ever be chosen?
ramen 3 times a day in the dingy 2 bedroom duplex and it was an upgrade from the miniature apartment in mid city L.A the one where there was a bullet hole in my window so what if the stripper and the landlordβs son got in screaming matches so what if the marine next to us beat his wife weekly for her infidelity despite the poverty experienced, despite the trashy and toxic domestic energy that dingy duplex was freedom to me and my family it was hope and salvation from the nightmare of indentured servitude L.A had been
mami dressed me up in ruffles and pastels whenever she could Iβd swirled and twirled in my dress until I got dizzy loved when everyone told me, βay que bonita te mirasβ and I awkwardly bowed, smiled, and hid sashayed to every single one of my relatives and did the same thing itβs one of the few times I remembered being vain as a child one of the few times I didnβt feel weird and like an outcast external validation learned at the tender age of 8
canβt blend in with this privileged world wrong age, wrong last name, wrong ethnicity I stand destined for failure on this institutions steps as the pressure to succeeds hang around me like a noose around my neck and yet I still keep going and show up every day if only to teach my kids a lesson in how to keep going when you want to quit
for almost three years Iβve been waiting for the next guy to appear as some kind of hero, as some kind of reward for all of my effort Iβve put into myself and the life Iβve built Subconsciously I did this Even as I publicly roared about being empowered on my own I still wanted someone to be my sanctuary to lay my love in And I wrote, manifested, schemed, flirted got obsessed with men were just meant to be friends Thinking, gosh, if I hang on long enough, heβll come around this might work out but today I discovered the only hero for me is the woman in the mirror who still manages to get out of bed even on the bad days when sheβs too tired to function when sheβs exhausted by all of it
clavos sobre el ataΓΊd del futuro que querΓa ni un prΓncipe azul ni una casita propia y bonita en vez mirΓ³ fijamente al caΓ±Γ³n de la pobreza tratando de buscar algo brillo de lo que alguna fui entre mis mucho sueΓ±os olvidados
nail on the coffin on the future I wanted no prince charming no house with the white picket fence instead I stare down at the barrel of poverty trying to find a glimmer of who I used to be among my many forgotten dreams
last time I had my last first kiss it was wasted on a middle age scorpio I wore a cute summer dress with red lipstick along with my feminine charm I didnβt have to lay it on thick for him to desire me for him to want to kiss me he wouldβve fuck me I hadnβt been on my period his hands roamed almost every inch of my body as if it belong to him for the 5 minutes we made out while I dissociated and pretended I was somewhere else I was numb and devoid of feeling anything Am I even a person? He said things about how I was so hot and sexy and how sad it was that couldnβt screw me And I laughed flirtatiously following the script Iβve had since I could remember and I felt no desire or any pleasure if anything I was repulsed by him, by myself hating how even at 40, I was still pulling the same bullshit since I was 16 making myself an object of desire for me to play with and then something snapped in me that day a couple of hours after that date I sent him a snap along with all the other 7 dudes I was entertaining and keeping as options the same message, βIβm sorry, Iβm not in a place to date or even to have men as friends, I wish you the bestβ it was hard as I had always been addicted to menβs attention and validation but something told me it was time to switch the narrative even though I knew it would be lonely
I hate it when I catch myself being unintentionally sweet It makes me feel vulnerable and weak Itβs almost as if my armor of empowered Queen is breaking and I canβt allow that to happen Iβve come too far in my heroineβs journey to allow romantic daydreams to disrupt it And Iβm tempted to erase his messages And block him Itβs not his fault or mine Itβs the faulty wiring in my brain it causes the logic in me to short circuit every time I talk to him
you were a dead end street that I didnβt see until it unraveled me Until it was too late and I didnβt want to turn around and kept going and eventually I crashed in the most magnificent and catastrophic of ways and I burned and burned until I was ashes and rose up in the most spectacular rebirth anyone had witnessed since Jesus
being with you was a form of self harm it was another symptom of my mental illness It was me living with my unhealed alcoholic daddy issues it was the worst version of me trying to find some kind of semblance of love to fill the void with whatever, even if that love looked toxic, brought out the worst in me, berated and assaulted me still stupidly I went back to you and accepted you in my life over and over again even with delusional daydreams in the back of my mind that if I kept you in my life long enough eventually youβd change and one day weβd get it right but all you ever did was disappoint me over and over again but this last undoing of us is the one and good riddance for that because at 43, iβm too fucking old to waste my time on fuck bois who canβt show an ounce of respect and dignity
my morality goes out the window when the madness appears itβs always a combo of impulsivity and hypersexuality longing for connection, longing for intimacy Longing to feel something other than the emptiness that lies within Itβs a temporary fix as I run away from my self made prison of stability
I pay tribute to the women who came before me women who sacrificed so my parents could exist my mami who had to leave behind her culture, traditions, and language to give me a better life to make sure I grow up safe and well educated and taught me what strength and resilience means as she worked long days to make ends meet as she showed initiative to move our family forward and with her example I was able to follow it except I change it up some to live a life full of love, community and creativity
at 17, the pregnant bride to be got a telegram from her groom sorry, but Iβm betrothed to another and am getting married at gun point maybe it was the heavy feeling of rage or her aries nature and hormones the jilted bride with a silent fury went to her closet and took out her ostentatiously beaded wedding dress and with matches in her hand she went outside and set fire to it in front of the family home one of the younger siblings saw the insanity as the bride stared at it mesmerized by fire that grew and grew she walked towards it all sense of reality gone from her not hearing the screams from her abuela who ran towards her and just before the bride step foot in the fire la abuela shook her and slapped her across the face until the bride reacted, let out a loud wail heard across the farmland and fainted