Necklace

This is a story about a necklace (btw.: as you can see, once I overcame my fear of drawing, I found joy in it, and now I want to do it again and again!).

Yesterday I had a really bad day. I had a talk at work earlier this week, explaining my problems and it was really good because I was as honest as I could be and I can be really scared of doing that when it could lead to confrontation. So I was being brave and I said it all and they listened. They recognized and acknowledged the problems and the share they had in things that went wrong. They promised to make things better and easier on me. I felt so proud of myself and relieved.

And then yesterday, after this talk, things went on in the same old fashion. I didn't feel protected at all, it was like the talk had never taken place, again blames were cast in my direction for a project that went wrong and I was so disappointed and upset by it. At the end of the day I rushed home trying to hold back my tears. And then when I got home, I got into a big fight with my boyfriend. It was so bad, that I did something I hadn't done since I was a child. Whenever I got so upset and powerless and frustrated that words could not express it anymore, I would grab the nearest thing and throw it across the room. Then I walked away, slamming the door behind me without saying a word and I just left and my parents would be really worried.

This is what I did now. I was eating a bowl of lemon quark during the fight. We were screaming and then I threw the bowl, still containing the lemon quark, across the table to the floor. Then I went into the bedroom, but I felt like I couldn't breathe and I had to leave. I went downstairs, put on my boots and my coat and I saw him cleaning the quark from the floor as he asked me: "Where the hell are you going?" I didn't answer. I just left, slamming the door behind me.

The only thing I knew would calm me down, was doing one of my favourite things: going to the cinema by myself, escaping inside a movie. But when I arrived at the cinema, the movie I wanted to see wouldn't show in another 1,5 hours. I decided to go somewhere quiet in the mean time. But I live in a small city, which makes it hard to find a quiet, private, anonymous place. I thought of a church first, but the one I saw that was opened was setting up some exhibition with workers walking in and out. Then I thought of the university library, because it was opened in the evenings when I studied, and I'd been wanting to see the renovations they had made over the past few years. I walked in and felt directly nauseous by the extreme nostalgia hitting me because the odour there was the same as it had been during my happy student days. But there were two guards sitting at the desk and they told me in the evenings I couldn't enter any further unless I was a student.

So then I was lost...I didn't know where to go anymore.

I just cycled and cycled. The scenery started to become more and more green, I was leaving the city behind. And at some point I found myself in an area I had never seen before. This was good, it distracted me, calmed me. I pretended to be somewhere else entirely. I entered fields filled with high grass and spring flowers of yellow, white and red. It became more quiet, leaving the noise of the city behind. I saw creeks with swans slowly drifting, old men fishing between lush green trees, little cycling paths with benches on the side. For a while now I hadn't seen anyone near. Through the trees framing the path I could see a tiny hidden open spot. I wriggled myself and my bicycle inside, and there I sat against a tree, hiding from the world underneath a roof of leaves. I felt grief and headache and tiredness overwhelm me. But I could finally let go. I had space to do that now.

And after going through all the anxious thoughts in my mind and crying warm tears, it became more quiet in my head. I slowly became more aware of where I was sitting. Cold, damp earth beneath my fingers. Tiny bugs crawling between fallen twigs. Fluorescent green leaves through which I could only see little cracks of blue sky. Suddenly my eye caught something that didn't belong in this natural space. Across from the tiny open space, something was hanging from the branch of a tree. I held my breath in excitement, forgetting all about my worries. It was a necklace. What was it doing here? Did someone leave it on purpose or by accident? It didn't look like it was an accident, because when I came closer I saw it was winded across the branch several times, like someone had really tried to attach it. Why would they have done that? Was there someone else here before me grieving and leaving the necklace as a symbol for what had happened to them? As I drew near I saw the necklace was made out of red twirling rope and it had two wooden beads. I held the hanger in my hand. It was heavy. A tooth-shaped stone with horizontal carvings. Who had worn this? It was like I became part of a new story. A fantasy story and this necklace was my clue. Or my passage to another world. The start of a journey or adventure.

This is called escapism. And I'm very good at it. This is why I think, when I finally get over myself, I should be a writer. When I was a little girl I wrote in another girl's "get to know your friends better book" my deepest wish: I wished that life was a fairy tale. She laughed at me and mocked me for writing that. This is what often happens when you tell people your deepest wishes. It's just how people are and how the world is. It hurts. People who say they don't care are liars or they have hearts made of stone. But I know could provide the world with the best escapes they could wish for. And that if I did that, life would become more like the fairy tale I imagine it to be. I would lose and indulge myself in my fantasy stories. I just lack the courage to do so. I'm sorry. I'm sorry for all the people who told me I'm talented that I disappoint them. I'm sorry for disappointing myself. I'm sorry. I hope I'll be ready someday.

I unwound the necklace from the branch and I put it in my backpack. I dragged my bicycle out through the trees and headed back to the city. I was on time for the movie: Prince of Persia. The best escape movie I could wish for at that moment. I know and see that it's not a good movie. But I enjoyed it very much. It contains a lot of elements I love and would use if I would make such a story myself. I think I have to collect those elements, and then maybe can I put them together and create the story finally. It did start already actually, but I'm afraid it will be no good. I have such high standards. Oh well...

At the end of the movie I returned home. My boyfriend was already sleeping. I lay beside him, quietly. He asked me where I had been. I said it didn't matter and that I was sorry for leaving like that. He said he had been worried. And then we slept.