In arms in Your Arms

"...Images of rapture creep into me slowly-BEEP- as you're going to my head and my heart- BEEP BEEP BEEP- beats faster when you take me over, time and tiii- BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEEEEEEEEEEPPP!- "I'm uppp! sweet weeping Jesus, I'm Up"! I screamed at none in particular, as my eyes sharply opened for the first time today. I looked over at my phone screen- it read 5:45 AM-and I pinched the bridge of my nose between my eyes to ease the pounding that exploded no doubt from my self-inflicted dehydration- when I did so and took a deep breath to resist the urge to roll back over for another 10 minutes and sat up to prepare to get ready for work. I've always thought I loved to work and loved to succeed in professional environments, but here lately, I've had a nagging feeling that something is missing from my life. But anyway, I digress. My morning routine is always done as close to the wire as possible with today being no different- get out of bed at 5:45, shower for 15 minutes, get dressed in five, piddle around till I'm late, and leave my front yard around 6:40 for work starting at 7. Today I somehow managed to stroll in around 6:53-and by somehow I mean driving 93 MPH the entire two exits between my shitty little single wide and this plant- and am proud enough to walk to my area with minimal shame for walking in at the same time as the people I am tasked with leading. After my no-shame walk of shame, I get my team started and then start a line of meetings at 7:30. The first up is the general start of the shift business- this person is absent, this person needs to train today, this person hates their mama, and yesterday someone's feelings got hurt and now we all have to talk about it. It's pretty run-of-the-mill stuff and for the life of me, I cannot focus on s**t anyone else is saying SOOOOO, Until it's my turn to report, I continue thinking about frolicking out in a field of dreams somewhere and disappearing from the face of western society. It's 8:15 AM before we finish talking about nothing or rather nothing that will still be the same in an hour- I love my job, I just can't always say from my heart that I like it and this is one of those times- and retreat back to our respective corners. Throughout the day, assembly lines fail, people leave, staffing is a nightmare and everything that can happen happens. I won't go into excruciating depth on my bland corporate existence, but what I will say is this- I'm now a clockwatcher and the day goes by painstakingly slowly. Once the team leaves at 3:30, I finish up my close-out reports and data entries and beeline for my ever-reliable Civic to take me home. On the way, I take the scenic route to avoid the inevitable a tad bit longer, which is me falling into a pit of existential dread scrolling before I change clothes and lather, rinse, and repeat for the next day's simulation. White-collar workers always say, "Livin the Dream" secretly means, "Every day I wake up and resist the urge to taste-test a 12 gauge" and buddy let me tell ya, the irony and the feeling expressed in this euphemism is never lost on me, in fact, I see it in VVS clarity more and more as the days roll into a giant never-ending hell loop. After an hour of driving and wandering around memory lane to avoid my driveway, I finally pulled up just in time to see the last bit of a Carolina sky turn into a deep navy blue underscored with black clouds- its cold, winter in the south is still winter contrary to popular belief, and today the cold is just penetrating deep in my soul making me come to a stark realization that the weather outside is starting to reflect the person inside this shell, empty dark, and teetering on becoming cold to any and everyone and i realize there's no more short cuts or back roads around it. My reality is-something has just got to give or soon I wont recognize the person looking at me from the mirror. I sit in my car for what feels like hours till I finally feel ready to make my way inside. I’ve never given birth but I know the feeling all too well waiting for me when I step inside. The dogs, the bills, the residents. Have all been staring at the drivers side door of that car waiting for me to emerge to claim their daily share of my attention. It’s never that I don’t want to nurture those relationships. It’s that I fail to nurture the one with myself. My dreams, my wants, my needs, all in favor of everyone else. I don’t know how I reached this point. But it now feels parasitic. MORE MORE MORE. Never a thank you or a reward. Just entitlement and loneliness. What I’ve realized is that this arrangement benefits everyone but me. And everyone else loves it and is gonna try and maintain the illusion that I love it too to protect their own interests. It’s Friday, so that means I’ve got two days to disillusion myself into believing I’m going to make something out of my free time- a nice hike, and shopping trip, a jog. AS IF. I bed rot until Monday and plaster on my fake smile. The show goes on.