Stuck In the Middle

Fear can make you stop dead in your tracks. And you stand still, hoping no one will notice that you've stopped while all the world continues on around without you. You learn to imitate its motions, going so naturally with the flow that you almost feel as if you could still be moving. So you begin to believe that being alive is half truth and half compromise. You give up what you have given up on. And you tell yourself that you can live like this, for a day, a month, a year, until you prove that you can regardless of how much you don't want to.

You think in some small way this makes life that much easier. To throw in the towel and wash your hands of the whole affair. To pretend you are who you always were and that nothing has changed you. But it has been years since you have been yourself and even longer since you have recognized your own face in the mirror.

You learned how to be defeated. To give up your dreams freely rather than allow for even one to be stolen. You blamed yourself for having too much confidence, too much pride. So you left yourself with none to even out of the score.

You gave yourself a rigid line of rules and held yourself straight and learned how to lean without bending. To say just enough without saying anything at all. To pretend not to understand while understanding more than they could ever know. You gave them all what they wanted, exactly what and whom they expected to see, fooling them all with the simple act of holding your tongue, knowing what words to keep and which words to say...

And you wait, preparing yourself, thinking maybe yes, this time you'll be brave enough to say exactly what you mean. Maybe then you'll understand how to cross the bridge and gain some distance.