I’m standing by the window naked, talking to the moon before bed. I thank the sky for something intangible that I can’t explain, and say I love you. A thought plunges into my daydream and slaps me out of my stupor—I am going to die. One day, I will die. Not just that, everyone I love will die. No wait, every single person alive will die. Every tree. Every blade of grass. Every ladybug. Everyone who’s ever been born or ever will be born. Nothing is permanent, nothing. My consciousness will not exist. I will not exist. My mind tries to comprehend the concept, and it can’t. My eyes well, and my breathing is shallow. Luckily it’s so unfathomable that I fall back into my stupor, get into bed, and pour myself even deeper into Love Island, though inevitably my mind wanders from my rewatch of Season Four and is present again. I sit up against my pillow and look back out the window; the light from the park lamps is warped and looks like the second star on the right from Peter Pan. So I guess it’s true; everything has an end. I have an end. Why is that so easy to forget? My first instinct is to build a super-transparent resin shell around me to keep all love, attachment, and experience out to soften the grief of it all. It wouldn’t be so bad. I’d decorate the bottom with shells and hang upside-down daisies from the ceiling. I’d play “Jump in the Line” by Harry Belafonte over and over to drown out the outside sounds and feel as safe as safe could be. Though then I think about my older self, with deep marionette lines and nipples even closer to the floor. I think about the little sparkle that stayed in my dad and grandpa’s eyes despite the yellowing, I hope she has that too. I think about her, and I hope she gets the chance to wrinkle and bend and reflect. I hope she looks back at the little moment of a life we had and wonders: Did we marvel at the cunty colour of the dragonflies? Did we fake sick and stay home from school to sway to the Dawson’s Creek theme song with a jar of pickles? Did we grieve the love we lost as deeply as we could? Did we memorize the way their bottom lip curled over? Did we have moments where we realized how lucky we were? Even if it was just for a second then we forgot again, did we have that second? Were we brave? Even if we were scared, did we try as hard as we could to be brave? Did we help people? Are the ripples we’re leaving behind beautiful? Did we have pleasure? Did we have agony? Did we have peace? Did we disrupt? Did we follow our heart as much as we possibly could, moved toward the truest, deepest depths of what our soul called to? Yes, she thinks, as a warm feeling moves from the tips of her toes to her head, and she sinks deeper into the mattress and her particles begin to drift somewhere else. Yes, I think we did.
