"...we're right on time..."

I think it's interesting when-
a group of songs comes in a point in your life and they mean so much. I think it's even more apropos when said group of songs comes from a band whose music is gracing the radio. This is how I learn that The Voice is everywhere. Sometimes it just depends on how hard I have chosen to listen.

***

I don't know if it's true. But I've decided to stop fighting it. I'm going to believe in this for you.

***

The blank canvas before me is spread taught across the frames.

I see this canvas. God, how I see it.

Stretching and yawning—indifferent. Blank. Wonderful.

            They told me I’d be rebuilt.

            Yes, yes they did.

            It occurs to me now that not one of them ever knew what that meant.

            Interesting. They all once seemed to know so much.

Who has the paint, I wonder?

Or the markers?

Or, dare I say it, the felt tip pens?

            I am unique.

            And you are not.

            Am I allowed the contradictions?

            Of course. You feel both things.

            There are two sides to every coin.

            Well said.

Who has the blueprints for this canvas?

Not me.

I have not seen them.

I doubt, on occasion, there are none.

It’s a silly thing: this doubt.

So much borne out of fear.

So much born out of fear.

***

...you are good to provide. We know our needs are met.

***

When the plane arrives, character will wait. Character will not leave her seat until everyone else has disembarked. Character will be polite about this.

At a certain point, halfway through Concourse A, character will realize how hungry she is. She will also, simultaneously, realize that she has not seen this side of 6am in a very, very long time.

The hunger, she can remedy.

Sleep will have to come later.

Character will then weigh all options in terms of inter-airport travel, as there are inevitably hundreds of ways to get from point A to point B. And even though this airport offers one of the best underground transportation systems in modern flying, character will not use it. She will prefer to walk. If, for no other reason, then to stay awake.

Somewhere between aforementioned point A and point B, character will realize that she has neglected to check the connections board and may be at the wrong gate. Or that her gate may have changed. Or something like that.

Who are all these people? character will wonder. And where are they all going? Usually these questions would occupy the character for hours, but her general sense of fatigue is winning. It’s not even ten o’clock yet and she’s been awake for so many hours. And people do this everyday. Character will not understand the mentality behind rising before six a.m.

Character will consider how long this next hour and a half is going to be. Fatigue lengthens hours by ten-fold. Because all the body asks for is sleep. Character is not available to give that one thing.

Character will have been fighting a steady set of nerves at this point. A set of nerves that kept her up most of the night previous. She is not good at staring these things down. She is also beginning to wonder why she continues to put herself in these situations. The ones without guarantees.

But she does. 

Character will acknowledge her commitment to finding a place to land and out of the cycle of perpetual hanging by a thread. She will continue putting herself in these situations as long as it takes to achieve the end gain. (Whatever the end gain is. Character will be unsure of that as well.)