Everything I’ve been thinking about that I’m not afraid to publish

1. Everything physical that matters here

“If you opened other people up, you’d find landscapes,” is something I wish I came up with myself. I didn’t. I stole it. I don’t even know where it’s from, just that I heard it in a class once and wrote it down (so now, it’s mine). 

I thought about the idea of opening other people up — not in the scary, surgical, frog-dissection type of way — but in the normal way. With questions. With answers. Perhaps you’d find landscapes.

I like to think landscape is a fancy word for graveyard. It’s everything physical that matters — that ever mattered — in one breath, in one place.

Everything physical that matters here are cigarette butts on friends’ porches and South Bend sidewalks, and you’ll make them pick it up and throw it away after they stamp it out (because God’s watching, and littering’s a sin).

Everything physical that matters here is the grass, which has never looked better and the sprinklers which never ever end (we’re getting sprayed in broad daylight; it’s only noon on a Tuesday, and now my trousers are soaked, but also, it’s only water, and it kind of felt good).

I like to think sometimes we’re all the same person living the same life here, that if you opened us all up, you’d find the same landscape. You’d find everything physical that matters here. 

I don’t know if it’s true or not, but I liked the sound of it. I liked the sound of it because it sounded beautiful. 

2. If all the world were washed

Last weekend, I saw Katie, and she told me she felt so washed. For a moment, I thought maybe I was washed up too, only I’m not at all.

Last weekend, I learned what a CV was. This was important because I networked with a nice man who asked me to send him my CV. I asked my boss and found out CV is a fancy word for a resume, so then I started updating my resume (I mean, CV). 

It’s funny feeling preemptively washed up when you don’t even know what a CV is. It’s also funny being Domer Dollar rich and getting to treat people to coffees, when you’re still crossing your fingers whenever you tap your real card at the Eddy Street Trader Joe’s (because you’re broke, but still need to buy your weekly bottles of cheap wine). 

It’s funny. It’s stressful. I wonder if the real world will be this chaotic. I wonder if the real world will give me ulcers too, or if that’s just something reserved for college. 

My God, I remember the ulcers. I remember carrying Orajel around with me for a couple weeks for my ulcers, my mouth tingling during R.A. training (it felt so good). 

I feared, if you opened me up, you’d find ulcers, but also if you opened me up, I’d smell like mint (thanks to the Orajel). I’d smell a bit washed up, only I’m not at all.

I wonder what it’s like to be washed up, to live in a world that’s washed, mostly because I intend to be. Mostly because I want out, but also I never want to leave.

3. There is even a moment right at the start

Someone asked me what fear was recently, and I froze. And then, I thought of another line I stole that I heard in a class and wrote down. 

It was a line about the abyss, how “there is even a moment right at the start where you have to jump across an abyss.” I think it’s from Nausea by Jean-Paul Sartre. I haven’t read it, but I probably should.

Because I’m starting to think that’s what fear is — the place before you leap. 

One of my greatest fears is being indebted to people, but another one of my greatest fears is opening up Venmo. 

I made an “IOU” list on a Thursday morning after a Wednesday night when I was bored — I owed $8 for the Corona, $6 for the vodka soda, $5 in cover, and would be paying $0 in Ubers because I DDed us earlier that night before Backer.

So I jumped across an abyss and opened up Venmo and paid everyone back with cute little Venmo notes (God, I love Venmo notes, but I just hate opening Venmo).

There was that other time I jumped across an abyss, and I worked on my CV. It’s not done, but it will have to be soon. And that other time I jumped across an abyss, and I decided to become a little less of a flirt. And that other time I jumped across an abyss, and I went for a run after weeks of not running (then fell and ate it, although it didn’t hurt as much as the last time I fell and ate it). 

Maybe the abyss is what you find when you open other people up. Maybe you find yourself somewhere in there too, on the other side, after you jump.