Entry #98

Exit
by Elizabeth Proctor


There are things I don’t want illuminated. Rifts I don’t want reopened. This is too much for me to think about and seeing it racing toward me, demanding I look at it—well, it makes me want to run away. Sometimes, that is the best choice, running away and NOT facing it. But this thing burns, reminding me that it will never really go away.

Can I really escape its grasp? Avoid going through the rift and dealing with what is on the other side? Can I just say “NO”?

Sometimes life hands me things that are well beyond my ability to handle and I can only do my best to NOT handle them. But they keep coming back, more fiery and painful than before. They stare me down, each time like an open rift--a baleful eye--daring me to say “no” yet again.

It flares up in my dreams, flashes in my windshield causing a blind spot, blinks in the corners of my consciousness—not quite clear, but always there; always mocking my attempts to get rid of it, pretending it isn’t there.

Sometimes, I wonder what would happen if I DID let it catch up to me. Would I shine as it does? Would I become as baleful as it appears to be? Or would I burn up with the knowledge that I really am NOT able to deal with it? I must decide if I will let it will catch me. I only have one week.