nonchalantghost

[nonchalantghost]

Outside the Window

Around 5 o’clock on a February evening, the naked trees are golden with the sun of late day. Even though it’s only 5 o’clock, the sun is almost gone because February is just like that. The wind that has plagued the upper region of Michigan's lower peninsula the last few days has finally subsided. The warmer-than-usual temperature today has melted the snowdrifts that crawl across the long roads from home to town.

               The few cars moseying down the road provide this small town with its definition of “rush hour”. No horns, no alarms, no sirens. The trivial amount of hustle and bustle that is generated by the locals will likely die down with the setting of the sun.

               The sky is a mixture of off-white and blue. Blue that only the sky can hold. There are swirls of pink overcasting the primary hues. Specks of grey scattered throughout. It is gorgeous. The air looks crisp and cool. It's like February incarnate.

               The familiarity of the sight almost makes me ill. I've seen it countless times before. The trees in the backyard. The wooden fence. The parking lot. The road. The local Dairy Queen. Main street. The giant tree in Washington Park. I spent an entire adolescence and half of a childhood staring outside this very window with a cigarette between my fingers and smoke in my lungs. I’ve contemplated growing up and growing old and getting out and getting even while looking at these sights. I've watched this exact scene fractalize and shatter into one billion pieces while experimenting as a teen.

               The images are years apart and the town has never changed. This is probably the only way I will ever feel while looking outside of this fucking window on a February evening around 5 o’clock.

[nonchalantghost]

You are not “too stupid” to create.

You are too exhausted to create.

[nonchalantghost]

Winters bright white light pours through your curtains relentlessly.

You still can't help but nap.

The season of death is the season of rest.

~Happy napping season to you and yours~

[nonchalantghost]

Moving Back Home Pt.I

Growing up in a small town filled me with wanting and wanderlust. In my adolescence, it became more than a quirky characteristic of longing and fantasy. It turned to rage and hatred. It made me angry, and sad, and kind of straight up made me wish I had never been born into it. It made me want to die. Ultimately, and fortunately, it made me far too spiteful to die in the town itself. I won't let it end here.

               I had tried leaving before. In 2012 I left for Denver and lived there in a little apartment complex. I loved hanging out in the train yard and watching the sunset between the mountain peaks each evening. I had just graduated high school and was finally able to start my life, on my own, away from my small town. I knew everything and was ready to take on the world. I fucked it right up. I came back 20 lbs skinnier with a drug habit. Not my best day.

               I think it was 2015 I tried again. This time I stayed in the same state but just moved to a bigger city. This didn’t last long. I had moved in with a man who wanted complete control of me. he wouldn’t let me drive or find a job, but that’s a story for another time. The point is that it didn’t work out. I went back home.

               My last attempt (and only success) was in 2020. I moved to Detroit. The COVID pandemic was in full swing and everything was locked the fuck down. I had steady money coming in from unemployment and stimulus and the man I'm with had a job set up too. It was going so well. I even went ahead and got a job just 2 months after I moved down there. I had a job and home and a partner and it felt so permanent and so stable. My life was finally starting. I felt alive. I even learned to drive really well in the city. I went to therapy and career counseling. I read a fucking self-help book, I started reading any book like I did when I was a kid. I had bills, hobbies, plans to start a blog and writing career, and was even making meaningful connections to people I had not grown up around my entire life, for the first time. I was submerged in culture and was so close to all the places I loved to go for concerts. There were things to do and people to see and even though I was still poor, I was going to do them. I took a moonlight hike, I saw my favorite band play, and I built a life. Then it came crashing down.

               We were just supposed to be coming back for the summer. That was the idea when we came up with it. 12 weeks. We didn’t know the landlord we were renting from would want to sell the house we were living in. He did. About 2 weeks before we were supposed to leave for the summer he asked if we wanted to buy the house we had been living in for 3 years. The neighborhood was a little rough. Our favorite neighbor was a crackhead, a bullet had gone through our front window, we’d had fistfights with other neighbors, and random would-be assailants knocked on our doors in the middle of the night. We didn’t want to buy it, and so we just moved out. The IDEA was that we would use the summer to find another place to live DOWN THERE. That’s not what happening, because you cannot plan life like that. I remember looking at my packed boxes one of the nights just before we left, thinking about how I should document it. Something I could be authentic about and maybe have people to relate to and find comfort in. I didn’t. I got too depressed. I knew it would be a dark time that people could relate to but no one wants to see me just waste my life by staring at the ceiling. I didn’t write or read or blog or anything. I haven’t found a new therapist and I miss my friends.  I feel out of control of my life and I am so sick of starting over, again.

               This is my reality. It’s better than some, but it’s not the best I’ve been. I want myself back. Geography shouldn’t get me down this much.   

[nonchalantghost]

Going back to my hometown is always such a vibe. I don't have any prospects anywhere else in the world, but it's still the one place I can't stand to live. I know I'll end up going back. I just needed enough time away to work on myself enough to not care what people would think when I did go back. And I've been gone for years. I'm at that point. I hate it there, but my partner hates it here. There are stray bullets coming through my windows and strangers knocking on my door in the middle of the night. There's no geographical cure for the misery that comes with poverty. I've learned that. At least when I'm back home, I'm poor WITH my family and all the other jabronies I've spent my life struggling with. There's community and comradery. As cliché as it may sound, that makes me feel "richer." I'll miss the city, and the food, and the sounds, and the one friend I've made along the way. I'll miss my little home in this sketchy neighborhood. I'm thankful for the experience. I don't want to go back. Maybe I'll just find a way to stay. Either way, I'm going home for 12 weeks this summer as a "trail" period. See ya around. 😘

[nonchalantghost]

Fucking filler

[nonchalantghost]

I'm only in Gerudo for the sunsets anyways 🌅🌅🌅

[nonchalantghost]

24/7 all access pass to your life.

I saw a meme going around a little while ago that said “letting everyone have access to you 24/7 is a relatively new concept.” Well, yeah. I suppose it is. It went on to say that because of this some of us might not answer texts or calls immediately or just seem “really bad” at posting happenings of our lives on the internet. The all-wise-and-mighty-meme then said that it’s important to take time in our lives to be unavailable. It sort of resonated with me.

       I am absolutely terrible at answering texts in a “timely manner”. I will hardly ever answer my phone when it rings. Staring right at it, watching it. Watching you call me and thinking “no, thank you.” My unread text number is barely ever under 10.  I don’t post anything about my life anywhere, hardly ever. (Unless, its going really, really well.) My parents recently came down to the city to see me. This was only the second time they’ve made the 4-hour car ride to see me in the 3 years I’ve lived here. I didn’t take a single picture. I didn’t post a single moment. I’m just not an all-access kind of gal, I suppose. According to viber.com 95% of text messages are read and answered within 3 minutes of being sent. Although those of us who also operate this way are in the minority. I think the trend is going to catch on. I think people are already getting sick of being up each other’s ass constantly. After all, I always thought the best part about a text was that I could answer it at my leisure. If they really needed my attention that minute, wouldn’t they call? Not that I would answer.  

       There are a few people in my ear trying to tell me that having an old school typed out blog is dead. Like, disco. They suggested that I do tik-tok and Instagram reels instead. I think that goes hand in hand with this 24/7 access stuff. I don’t want people to hear me or see me. I want them to read me. I don’t want to post a video passionately over-explaining my current hyper fixation just for some brain-dead idiot to comment on the cleanliness of the room I’m sitting in or the state of the lawn I’m on. You know the idiots I’m talking about. I don’t like being on camera. I like to write. So, that’s what I’m going to do. People be damned.

[nonchalantghost]

🌌🐉

[nonchalantghost]

There's a bee butt! 🐝 🌸🌷🦋