I can feel it on my skin, the feather’s touch, the cold fingers searching for the secret spot where I hide my regrets. It smells of yesterday’s lullabies and wishes that never came true.

The people around me are so young; younger than I ever was, I’m sure of it. I don’t remember feeling the innocence I see on their faces. I wish I could go back, but at the same time, I don’t envy the lost love, the addictions, and the failures they all face. Maybe they won’t have to endure my path, but it will be a variation on the theme.

I am jaded; wasted by the squandered moment that ticked away the last hour, the final dream with no chance of coming true. I wonder what my dreams consisted of as my adulthood collapsed upon me. I don’t remember. Mostly they were undefined; hiding beneath a white line and a stream of friends with no names and whose faces are only a smear upon my memory.

I spent hours in a classroom pretending it would make me smarter; thinking a pigeonhole was a place I wanted to live, and that the corporate ladder could lift me beyond the broken pillars of my parents’ lives. I did my time behind a desk, and hid behind an upholstered cubicle wall with Post-its reminding me of all the things I wanted to forget. I still haven’t found my place in the working world even though I’ve ventured down many dead ends and wasted alleys.

I released the love of my life, and now he marries someone else, the one he was destined to meet after I was gone. I’m happy for him and hate him for moving on so easily. Why are some offered sweetened lives while others dive into the bottomless pit of Walmarts and jobs we hate?

I live my life with a dreary attitude of inescapable nothingness with only a pinpoint of light consisting of the words on this page. Victory has bred with mediocrity and given birth to my existence. I am no more a failure than I am a success. My life has been full, and full of regrets.

Going through some of my old writing tonight. If you like this you might also like

Grandma Mabel

If it Rains