We are

A Story by Nechelle

August 31, 2015 11:27 am

I just let my storage unit to get clothes for my interview this afternoon. Felling flustered, off kilter, and very strange. I'm at the Mill and an iced cafe late made with house made nut milk sweetened lightly with dates is sitting in front of me and am wondering how or why I just paid almost $7 for this thing + tip.

What am I doing? I've been craving coffee for over a week now.

There is an extremely cute fluffy black dog tied to the bike rack and I wish I was petting him, or that he was mine.

Kenzie's house is across the street. Which happens to be be where I will be later today, but why am I here now? I could barely drive my car or park it to get here. Something strange is happening.

I'm a bit envious of the artist types sitting inside, dressed and ready for the day, with this, seemingly being what they got dressed and ready for. To sit inside chatting, checking their email, Facebook, texts, looking very

isolated. engrossed.

No one is smiling. Besides the register boy greeting people as they walk up to the counter. I threw my debit card at him while trying to pay. The lack of control I had over myself causing it to fling out of my hand as I attempted to give it to him.

My glass has condensation on it and I've only had 2 or 3 sips out of it. My stomach is a little queasy already and I wonder what I'm doing here drinking this.

Coffee gives me a stomach ache, and anxiety and I haven't drank it in ages. Besides when I had some at Oma's the other day and didn't get a stomach ache and only a twinge of anxiety that was easily bypassed by an ounce of awareness as to why it was there.

There is a lot going on around me, and it is chaos, in my opinion. Cars whizzing by. people everywhere. I can see 16 people around me. No 18, 19. and realize I haven't been around this many people since Asher had people over the morning of Melissa's Birthday and that was a long time ago. Unless you count everyone at the Awareness Institute for Wednesday class, which I don't. They're people but we've all looked into each other's eyes and seen our souls.

I guess I was around a ton of people at the Luau, and at restaurants, but I wasn't by myself. I was with my family. I just realized I am here, not alone, but with all the people around me. We are here together. I just don't know these people. Know them as in, know their names, or why they came here, or what it is they tell themselves when they look into the mirror every morning. Or if they even look into a mirror every morning, or this morning, although it looks to me as if they have. Or who they love. Or what makes them cry, or fight, if they don't let tears fall from their eyes. If they don't let tears run down their cheeks to fall on the pages beneath then, if they don't do that, I can be pretty sure they do something else. And I don't know the whys or whats but I do know that everyone has them and that under the whys and whats is a soul, just like mine. And I Know that we are all here together.

I'm not here alone. We are here together.

I'm going to ask the man next to me if he will watch my stuff while I use the restroom. I wonder what will happen.

If anything.

Nothing happened. Besides that my stuff became his stuff for a moment or two. And now it's mine again.

When I was in the bathroom I saw myself in the mirror, noting how I happen to look like the artsy type with seemingly nothing else to do besides be here drinking a $7 iced cafe late with house made nut milk sweetened lightly with dates while I sit outside writing something that is likely artsy, given my appearance, in my journal.

I also look like I looked in a mirror this morning, which I did, briefly.