Burning the past …..

I had been searching for something for over an hour, Despite my small bedroom in the winter being cold, at the best of times, …I was hot , tired and getting more antsy by the minute with this more organised self for not putting things in their rightful places, …But it is still a fairly new phenomenon for me….Past me didn’t just have the one messy drawer in the kitchen, like most homes, oh no I was lucky if I had one tidy drawer, but this was me in my other life, my living with others, my trying to organise a balloon race in a whirlwind days,….since living alone now, I have drawers for every thing, I love being able to locate exactly what I want, when I want it, without stress, without the running about breathless ,red faced and ready to kill something…..

But today I had sadly let myself down, I found books, papers, half finished crochet projects, hundreds of coloured pencils , everything else, including things long since forgotten……one of these things where a pile of old Diaries of mine…..these were from years long ago, I flung them on my bed in temper , these were not what I needed, ….Coffee I decided!, I knew from long ago that if you just go and do something else, anything else, then come back later you may just find what your seeking…..I bought my coffee in ,sat on my bed, then sipped the hot comforting brew ,I began mindlessly thumbing through the well worn pages of the first diary.

it was a jade green silk fabric covered book about six inches tall nothing remarkable, it had in its time obviously been well made use of, it’s cracked back now broken with time, from my missive,a , I had obviously pushed back the covers to be able to fill each scrap of lined paper more fully, I had covered sections between my work with drawn Chinese open mouthed dragons , orchids, lilies, and of course the odd horse, there was stuck on pictures, stickers and doodles of matchstick people, I smiled as faint memories of doing this surfaced , I lay back against my pillows , pulled over a throw and began reading the poorly written words yesteryear ….these first pages were kind of sweet,fun,.. I was looking back on a childhood memory of a day at the beach, with my family , aunts ,uncles, the sounds of the sea against shingle, seagulls, laughter of playful children, smells of the sea , funfair, hotdogs, onions, and Ambre solaire sun lotion,And that wonderful butterfly feeling of excitement,

as I turned the pages, and the years though, the depth of my unhappiness really hit home, I felt imprisoned, stifled, lacking any kind of love and affection , like now I suffered a lot of pain ,illness and how I made it through was to this day beyond me, I can still remember longing to be held, heard, to feel the warmth of a hand holding mine, I really didn’t know any kind of affection what so ever, ..page after page of crying out for a soft word, touch or just someone to know I even existed , ….I felt enslaved with no one to care what I needed, And why should they, I no longer cared either….I flung down the little book in disgust, almost as if reading it had made the already grey sky outside Darker and more foreboding, what has been a chill earlier was now eating into my bones, I pulled my purple soft fleece throw up to my chin for warmth , almost like a protective armour from what threatened to drag me into its foggy blackness,

I sat there still , looking at the pile of small books , they made me feel uneasy, like the past was contaminating the cosy safeness of my room, I’m not sure how long I had sat there, unable to tear my eyes from the offending books, the green silk diary I had read from,now lay open, I could see the pen outline of an oriental lion, tongue out, wide eyes and scraggly mane, memory after memory flashed before my eyes, I could hear voices raised in anger, hatred, and even all these years later I wanted it gone, away from me , I had begun a new life, finding gradually the me, that back then I had longed to discover, ….I still don’t know who , what I am, my every decision made for me then, what clothes I wore , hairstyle, where I could or couldn’t go, food I ate, …..the books lay small upon the bed, yet I felt they enveloped every tiny space, blocked out the light, sucked air from the room……

picking them up carefully and as though they would poison me simply by touching them,, I carried them into the livingroom, … sat down in front of the log burning stove, the door whining, as I swung it open, ……there I paused for just a fleeting moment, I listened about me for sounds of familiarity,… I could hear the soft breathing of Jesse as he slept, it broke through the thick dark cloud that not only filled the rooms , but threatened to swallow me whole into its inky unforgiving nothingness………I clung like a limpet to that one piece of warmth, the sound I knew so well, familiar, deep rich warm and a salve to my tattered nerves……

it broke through enough , that without any more thought, without question, I began tearing out page after page, stopping only long enough to take a match, strike it and hold it to the first balled up crumpled piece of paper , it flickered, flashed and it’s light filled the darkness of the gaping mouth of the log burning stove, I watched the pages unfurl, become distorted, …..words filled with hurt, anger, pain and torment, that had mere moments ago bought a cloying blackness, now burned brightly, orange, gold, yellows danced before my eyes almost hypnotically, setting each word free , with spirals of rising smoke, cleansing and as it did it warmed the room, not only the room but me!, Yes all this hurt that had previously turned my blood to ice, now warmed my face, hands, and bought an almost cathartic comfort, ….book after book burnt, I would never have to look upon those deep days of pain again, I felt instantly relieved, and freed of the past , now I truly could turn the page and write my new story …….