Like A Bird.

Letting go.
Probably one of the hardest endeavors we will face in our lives. Just the thought of freeing our hands and letting whatever we are gripping so hard onto just fall, is terrifying. Not to mention something we do more than ever as teenagers. I mean how can we befriend so many people and simply let them fall out of our lives so suddenly? What surprises me is our courage to do it intentionally.

Relationships, 90% of the time at our ripe adolescence, don’t last. We all know that the one we date in high school will probably not end up being the one we marry or share the rest of our life with. Well most of the time.
So why do we take on this commitment, if we know it’ll eventually end? If we know that one day we’ll have to leave that person and maybe never speak to them again? Well because we like that idea. Humans hate the concept of something permanent. As much as we don’t like to admit it, security scares us. The thought of always being able to have something whenever we need it for the rest of our lives is something we cannot stand. Why? Well for starters it’s boring. And second, we love the spontaneous factor in life. Some more than others. Being able to wake up in the morning and not know how the day will go is something we sometimes thrive on. Who wants to wake up knowing exactly how their day will go? I mean isn’t that why the movie Groundhog’s Day was made?

Back to what I was saying.

After we go through the kisses and the cuddling and the falling asleep to each other’s voices, there comes a time where we just say “…next.” Where we decide we’ve had enough and need something new.

Then comes the hard part. Loosening the tight grip we’ve had on this one person for so long and just letting them fall into their own lives without us. The way we can actually do this just blows my mind. The way we can readjust to our lives like some animal that was thrown in a completely different environment and left to survive. And when we finally decide to shut our eyes, hold our breath, and jump into the lives we know will hurt us for a while, we go through those dreadful stages.

There’s the Numbness. The denial, the “alright, I can do this, no biggie.” This of course comes after that whole night of sobbing and binging on chocolate.
Then comes the Irritation. The whole “he’s such an idiot/why did this happen/I wish I could erase everything” phase. The point where you just cry out of frustration all the time and blow up on your friend for dropping your pencil.
In the middle of all this comes Uncertainty. “Maybe he was right. Maybe I did do something wrong. ” This is when one basically bargains on whether or not they really want to remain without this person. It’s when we begin to blame ourselves and maybe even contemplate speaking to that person again.

When we’re almost there, Depression comes in. Yep, this stage is the worst but believe me when I say it always comes. The moping, the loss of confidence and inspiration in life. The “Am I even good enough?”
And when we’ve gone through this entire journey, when we get to the finish line with our clothes shredded and our bodies weak, there comes Acceptance. Giving us all hope that it will get better and that the hole in our heart will now be patched up with something else that makes us just as happy.

These stages sound a lot like the 5 stages of grief don’t they? Well that’s because when we let someone go, when we set them free from our lives to busy someone else's, we do mourn. Because it is losing someone extremely close to you. And although it may not be forever, it is for a long while, and most of the time abrupt. To just cut off communication so quickly from someone you’ve been around for so long is astonishing. And those who have done it should give themselves a pat on the back for being so brave and letting loose from the fixation that was binding them.

And when we do feel lonely, or sad, or regretful, that the person we enjoyed spending time with the most is out of our lives for good, we must always remember that we are just doing what we are programmed to do; live freely, move on, and be happy.

Let's Play "Find the Symbolism"

Landon had always been a different boy. No one had known much of his life except for the few mumbles he would occasionally exchange with strangers who had asked. Ever since I had met him he had been a mysterious fellow, something that had attracted me more to him, to his care free way of living.

Months had passed and we became inseparable. Spending the days together and unraveling each other's personalities, one ribbon by one.
But for some reason I felt I wasn't discovering every piece, and that there were still some places left untouched for no one to see.
Over time I had noticed his friends had started to disappear. They were no longer connected to him in any way and when I asked about it, he would shrug and tell me they had grown apart. One time he even told me they had moved away to a better place. Somewhere near Southern California.
But one thing I noticed was ever since I had met the boy, an infuriatingly bothersome tapping would occur on my window at night. The same small red bird would show up at my window for months, tapping away at my window and depriving me of my sweet rest. Every night I would try to go to sleep, and every night the patter began again. But each time I had thought to shoo the bird away, to get it far from my sanctuary, the thought of Landon had come to my mind, and his soft words put me at ease and I simply fell asleep.
Over time I saw Landon less and less, his life had become more of a mystery to me than I had expected it to be. He was disappearing and reappearing in my life without notice. When I would ask him where he was he would shrug and mumble something I couldn’t hear. My hearing had worsened through the weeks and I could barely hear a word unless someone had spoken up. My mother said it was because of the loud music I would play when the bird would show up.
It was Friday night and Landon had called me to go out to eat somewhere. I debated on whether or not I should leave, whether I should spend my time with him, and there was that noise coming from the window once again. The bird was louder this time. I never understood why it bothered me so much, but because of the it’s incessant pounding, I had decided to leave while my migraine hadn’t formed yet.

Motionless.
My eyes shielded, my limbs shaking from the harsh cold hitting it. My arms and legs tied, with nothing under them but cold metal.
I heard the heavy door open. A loud noise followed as it shut and footsteps became more and more clear even through the only muffled sounds my ears could produce.
I felt ice. Buckets and buckets of ice hitting my already numbed body. They hurt, more and more with each throw, each toss filled with such hatred.
I began to shake, to feel the anger in me envelop due to the frustrating cold.
The cubes hitting me like pieces of glass, penetrating my tough skin.

The pelting had finally stopped. I was left dripping with water, shaking uncontrollably and clenching my hands together as if it would warm me up even a little.
It suddenly became warmer. I could feel the sun beating down on my frozen skin, my blue hands and feet, loosening the rope and blindfold that had prohibited me from identifying anyone or anything.
I slowly took off the blindfold and squinted. Everything was so blurry, as if I hadn't seen it before, as if where I was standing was completely unfamiliar to me. Where am I? I thought. This can’t be somewhere I’ve been to before. As hard as I tried I could not make out the place.
But my eyes finally adjusted slowly to see I was standing right inside of Landon’s room.

I scrambled to run, to find a way out of the dim cell, but held my breath when I found him filling up buckets of ice outside. I froze in my footsteps and felt a chill run down my spine. He was going to hurt me, and had hurt others. The man I had always seen as my compassionate everything was a monster. And before I could regain my thoughts to turn around and escape, I felt a hand on my shoulder. “It would probably be in your best interest not to move” the deep voice behind me said.
The voice that had once told me I was beautiful.
I remained immobilized as I felt a hard object brush against my neck. Too scared to see what it was, I shut my eyes hard.
“This is me, this is who I am." he chuckled. "What, you didn't know?" he smiled slyly. "That's no surprise, you’re stupid anyway."
He made his way to me, speaking so closely I could feel his breath on my neck. “This is how I do it. Freeze them until they’re so numb they can’t feel a thing”. His grip on my arm had become tighter, his hands no warmer than my body. I attempted to look for an escape, anything that would free me from this grip that seemed impossible to break away from. But there was not a thing; just an empty room with a knife to my neck, waiting to take me away from my life.

I awoke out of breath, as if what I was dreaming of had stolen my life from me the entire time I had been asleep. Panting, I noticed I could see everything around my room, sharper, clearer than I was used to. I sprouted up to get myself some water but could barely hold the cup in my shaking hands.
I had returned to my warm room and sat down onto my bed. I let out a deep exhale and shut my eyes, attempting to analyze what had possessed my dreams to be so frightful. When I had finally decided to stand up, I peeked outside and was astonished at what I found before me. There on my window sill was a small red bird, motionless and dead.