Love is like π.|Natural, irrational, and very important.

I love to read. I don’t mean that in a I-pick-up-the-latest-Oprah-recommended-book-to-read-at-the-pool kind of way, I mean I am kind of obsessed with reading. When I was younger, my parents believed that reading was a means to an end…you have to know how to read well in order to do well in school, to study. So we didn’t have very many books in the house. This turned out not to be a big problem for me–I read manuals, for everything and anything. I think that’s why I have a pretty good grasp of most mechanical concepts at this point in my life. Thanks, Mom and Dad!

In fifth grade, one of the books on our required reading list was The Hobbit. Most of my classmates grumbled and complained at it’s length, it’s use of “big” words, it’s somewhat complex back story. I couldn’t get enough of Tolkien’s writing. Everyone else skimmed the descriptive passages, I read them intensely, imagining each detail in my head. So when I was done with The Hobbit, I scoured our tiny school library for more Tolkien. Lo and behold, I found The Lord of the Rings.

I trotted up to the checkout desk laden with my treasure, placed it on the counter, and grinned like a monkey. Our school librarian looked at me over the top of her little glasses and smiled condescendingly.

“I think these are a bit above your age level, dear. Why don’t you try some C.S. Lewis?”

Not one to be turned away so easily, I made some smart ass comment. I don’t remember exactly what I said, but I know it shocked her, because I can remember her face looking like someone had smacked her. She shook her head, and slammed the books around a little, but I had won the battle, and I lugged the books home with me that day.

I didn’t sleep for the next three nights, and I really didn’t care. This was it, what I had been looking for in all those insipid short stories in our Literature books and that irritating Babysitters Club tripe. I didn’t want paragraphs of descriptions of horrid school dances, I wanted a tale of honor and glory and love and war. (Especially the war. I really liked that.) And so began my love affair with LOTR. For the next 3 years I had one or more of the books in my possession at all times, until in the fall of 8th grade, my librarian pointed out that someone else may want to read them, occasionally. So I begged and pleaded with my parents (who were utterly confused–what 13 year old girl wants books instead of clothes for Christmas?) and I hoped and hoped until on Christmas morning, I saw the package. It was rectangular and heavy, and I did a little dance because I knew what it was.

I still have those books, and I still read them. They are extremely well-loved, spines worn and separating and pages dog eared. Like the Velveteen Rabbit–if you love them enough, they become Real.

Writing has always been cathartic for me. When I write about an event, a person important to me, somehow I am able to process it in a way that makes more sense to me. And yet I have been avoiding putting pen to paper, or fingers to keys. I’m not sure what this means, except that I am not wanting to let go of some things that are still percolating upstairs.

The mind is a dangerous place, my mind especially. Neurons form associative pathways based on past experiences, and it is extremely difficult to reprogram them. Add to the mix…well, we’ll call it background noise, and some days I feel like the top of my head is about to explode outwards in a shower of gore and fire. I am a person who takes medication to keep things manageable, and I make no apologies for this. There is a marked difference in my mood and tolerance for everyday stumbling blocks when I do not, so I have chosen to keep taking meds. Even still, I find myself ruminating on past life experiences more lately, and I think maybe it is time that I purge.

I know part of it has to do with the weather. It’s spring, and warm with a cool breeze, the kind of day I used to hope for when I was running in Baltimore. That way, you see, it’s not too hot or cold in the abandominium hideoouts where I and the other junkies liked to sit and hoard our meager scores. I miss sitting on scavenged milk crates, avoiding foul-smelling piles in the corners, and talking big with random people. I know it’s somehow disturbing that I miss the griminess, the feeling of being bad, the rush of my heart when a cop drove by (”Will he stop? Does he see me?”), and I want to leave it behind. It seems to dog me, waking and asleep. It would be so easy to slip back to that life of running and hiding and dealing with nothing.

So I guess I keep putting one foot in front of the other, having little community meetings in my head, and trying to concentrate on the good in my life now. Some days it’s just really fucking hard.