Stuff I've Been Feeling Lately

by Alicia Cook

I flip through photo albums and see my likeness in someone I can’t manage to recognize anymore, even when I squint. She shares my fingerprints. They tell me it’s me. It’s as if I am wearing hand-me-down memories from a life that doesn’t fit quite right.

experience that familiar itch of frustration as I struggle to name the girl in the photo.

Currently Listening To: Sara Bareilles, “She Used to Be Mine”

The strongest people I know aren’t bulletproof. They have felt the searing pain of life’s shots. The strongest people I know make the decision every day to wake up and place their two feet on the ground even though they know the monsters beneath their bed will grab at their ankles.

Currently Listening To: 50 Cent, “In Da Club”

She was so far gone, even her own shadow kicked her when she was down. Friends and family would tell her she would be her old self in no time flat.

Why would she purposely go hunting for that girl just to feel all the pain she had once felt?

Why? If that meant having the memories, mistakes, and regrets find her again, too? No, she didn’t want to become her old self again.

If she survived her latest misadventure, she vowed to become someone entirely new. Currently Listening To...

It needs to burn so you know it’s healing, she explained.

That small exchange during my adolescence helped me learn to appreciate the pain pulsating from my broken heart.

It was one of those special car rides where every song on the radio was one of my favorites. The road was open and smooth, freshly paved.

picture never fully captures the reasons behind why I want to freeze the moment in the first place.

The lens of a camera cannot capture any of that; my heart does. Currently Listening To: Lady Antebellum, “Goodbye Town”

Plan B is never preferred. Detours and alternate routes are never quite as scenic.

Currently Listening To: Goo Goo Dolls, “Rebel Beat”

Because of this, and so much more, I will never settle on simply surviving ever again. I choose to live. Currently Listening To: OneRepublic, “I Lived”

I caught a glimpse of the girl I had been missing greatly the last couple of months. It was nice to see her again. So Sunday, I sang along with the radio really loudly and unapologetically, I drank three mimosas before one o’clock, and I didn’t wear a jacket.

You embrace my complexity and bravely swim against my current. You do not fear the pull of my murky undertow.

Currently Listening To: Ed Sheeran, “Tenerife Sea”

It is a hard pill for me to swallow, but I do believe it is in the navigation that you find your way, and inevitably find yourself. Currently Listening To: Miranda Lambert, “Mama, I’m Alright”

Not when I need you here the most, but when I want you here the most.

Letting go of even the wrong heart can play tricks on one’s mind, confusing two souls that once mated for soul mates. So, please, the next time the smell of Chanel fills up a room and you find yourself reminded of me, remember: I never even wore perfume. Currently Listening To: Nancy Sinatra, “Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)”

Without even a hesitation, the child responds, If I still have the pieces, why wouldn’t I keep rebuilding? Currently Listening To: Eminem, “Solider”

Home: where love and support concurrently grounded me and encouraged me to fly. Currently Listening To: Carrie Underwood, “Don’t Forget to Remember Me”

Days I am overwhelmingly sad for reasons I cannot pinpoint. Days I will no doubt attempt to pull a door clearly marked Push. Most days I find myself stumbling over flat surfaces and expectations.

Currently Listening To: Sublime, “Waiting for My Ruca”

However, it’s another thing entirely to look back in your darkest moments and still see them standing in your corner, encouraging you to stay in the ring and FIGHT, when the odds aren’t in your favor and all you want to do is throw in the towel.

Packing up your belongings means nothing if you can’t box up your heart, scribble fragile along the side, and take it with you, too. It’s hard to walk away, even if you know in your heart of hearts it’s necessary. Even if your feet can’t do the job and you find yourself crawling on your hands and knees away from a toxic situation, be proud of yourself. You are removing yourself to better yourself and you will stand on your own two feet again eventually. So crawl, walk, or run; the how doesn’t matter. Your new life is waiting for you.

Does your brain ever slow down? No. Currently Listening To: Cage the Elephant, “In One Ear”

like to believe I am outgrowing who I was and what I needed when I was that person. I like to think I will shed all of this, even the skin you’ve touched. It’s nice to think about. Currently Listening To: Ingrid Michaelson, “Hell No”

It’s commonplace to ramble off I lost myself, when you go off course. It’s the perfect excuse,

Something broke me, and I need to be fixed. Grief will do that to you.

Grief will do that to you. Currently Listening To: Lynyrd Skynyrd, “Free Bird”

That morning the park was blanketed in virgin snow. The bare trees wore the flakes like diamond earrings.

Thirty years old and I still think a moment will wait for me to catch up.

This pain is reminding you that you are alive. There is an empowerment uncorked in grief. Your life will never be the same, ever, so you can never be the same, ever. Pain will make you stronger, but it will make you a lot of other things first. Maybe at its worst, it will cripple you; but, maybe, at its best, it will become your superpower. Currently Listening To: Queen, “We Are the Champions”

This doesn’t mean I am growing in the wrong direction. It’s important to remember no one needs to be in my corner as long as I am in my corner. No one needs to witness my comeback; what matters is I come back. This is not a classic underdog story; I am not a phoenix. I did not rise from the ashes— I crawled out from under the soot,

have begun measuring life not just in numbers and years but in sunsets and trees blossoming and brilliant views.

am under construction. Not many people like to admit that, but everyone is always in the process of becoming something else. No one is ever really finished—constructed and complete.

Days in a daze become weeks of being weak. Months become moths that eat holes into my favorite moments. There was a time I laughed more, was more lighthearted and whimsical. There was a time I smiled in more than just pictures. There was once a time I at least attempted to end pieces on high notes. I’ll get back there. See? A high note. Currently Listening To: Ben Rector, “Fear”

have been the collateral damage to a number of life tragedies that were not directly my own. I’ve swept up messes I haven’t created and dried tears I haven’t cried. I’ve aged just by witnessing others lose years. Self-destruction destroys more than just the individual. Currently Listening To: Christina Perri, “Butterfly”

am not going to apologize for my life, just like how life did not apologize to me when things weren’t going my way. Currently Listening To: Maren Morris, “Second Wind”

We need both. We need the good and the bad to be who we are. For better or worse, we need both. Currently Listening To: Ingrid Michaelson, “Drink You Gone”

Not only was life still going on, it was still smiling at me. Currently Listening To: Luke Bryan, “Drink a Beer”

Currently Listening To: Anna Nalick, “Breathe (2

Currently Listening To: The Airborne Toxic Event, “Sometime Around Midnight”

Currently Listening To: Amy Winehouse, “Tears Dry on Their Own”

Currently Listening To: Tim McGraw, “Meanwhile Back at Mama’s”

Currently Listening To: Zac Brown Band, “Highway 20 Ride”