if you don’t believe me

to my now self re my ten years from now self

just make sure what you get
is worth what you give
up
in exchange

you’re the only one
you’ll answer to
when too many years to go back
go by

you’ll be left with the same truth
that is now

if you don’t believe me
lie to yourself
some more
and see what happens.

© jmr 08.2013

you don’t have to call first…

Before I met you, I had no problem with admitting that this was it – my life… and everything in it was mine (by my own doing, my own choices, my own mistakes)… all that I have, I earned… fought for… kicking and screaming and it’s mine… achieved with my own two hands…my own intellect… my own strength.

I know I’ll never be 17 again; when the future was crisp like the morning air and my life waited ahead, as far as the eye could see.

When I could race without fear, when there was still abundant forgiveness for my wiley and curious ways, when I didn’t have a care in the world…

As the years flew by, I became resolute… I fell into routine and made amends with the young woman in my heart… Apologized to her for letting her believe I’d still be able to make her laugh wildly, let her run recklessly with the wind blowing through her hair… I packaged my acceptance up neatly in a gift box, affixed a bow and tucked it away into the furthest corner of my top closet shelf.

Then I met you. And you shook me up. You came out of nowhere and made me question everything I do, who I thought I was, why I’d given up.

You gave me love… real love; unconditional and unwavering. You expect greatness from me… and I am starting to believe that the me you see is the me I already am… you make me a better woman; you make me want more, everything, faster, fuller and NOW.

I feel anxious, but not in the way that you think. I feel like I’m waiting for the future to begin and it’s so close I can taste it but I can’t do anything to speed things along. I have my eyes on the one thing that will make me happy and every day wasted without moving toward it is another day I sit here in the same place wishing on the same star dreaming the same dream and doing nothing to make it come true.

I have climbed up and grabbed the box from the top shelf, tore open the wrapping and tried on all the wishes I tucked away. I’m sitting alone in my room wearing my party clothes with no place to go.

Just come get me, already – I only need to grab my shoes. You don’t have to call first – I’ll know it’s you before I even hear the doorbell ring…

©jmr/2002

the more things change…

the moments fly by

til they become days

then years

and the reflection in the mirror

is no longer familiar

it isn’t the features that change

as much as the look

in my own eyes

and every move ahead

seems more and more like

history repeating itself

© jmr / 2009