detonate

for a long time i struggled to figure out how to live as the person i'd suddenly become. a person who woke up one day and was no longer anyone's daughter. what does that mean? what does that look like? who are you once that original title is disintegrated? what becomes of my daughterly rebellion, especially when said rebellion had been so long under way and so close to being won? 

.

who am i to yell at?

who am i to war against?

i war against a dead woman's ghost and memories of an absentee father.

what does that mean? 

what do my tantrums accomplish? 

.

i spin in sadness, always unexpected, for however impossible and stupid that seems. i mean, it seems stupid and impossible even to me.  i am aware there is plenty to be sad about.  i should never be shocked by sadnesses arrival. accepting reaity has been harder than i'd thought it'd be. 

.

alex said: when i think about your story and your family and what you've come up against, i think it's incredible you didn't detonate your own life.

. 

i like that she chose that word: detonate. 

.

i remember a good and awful majority of my explosions. 

i look at my lips and eyes and see my mother.

i look at my shoulders and eyebrows and see my father.

i am glad to have set the family molotov cocktail down. 

now: the arduous task of inching away and not picking it back up.