written by me
at UWC Atlantic College
in 2010

It was like buying a movie ticket because the trailer seemed good. But halfway through, it’s obvious that judgment skills need to be improved upon, so you walk out never knowing the end. And what you’ve had from that is an experience where you were on the brink of exposure to something new, but ended up learning something unsatisfactory about yourself. You’re left with a conversation piece, a short conversation piece. Like the work of art you bought at that very interesting store which had all these interesting looking buyers striding in and out the door. Personally, you understood the art in a way that only the chemicals in your crazy mind could try to explain in convoluted, pretentious sounding sentences. But then comes along that dinner guest who’s read such and so book, and met that wonderful Parisian, freelance artist who said this and that about acrylics, (and what else – shared biological material with Picasso?), all of which has left you feeling a little like a person who now owns a piece of art that doesn’t yet belong to them; as if you’d forgotten to pay the mysterious man in the store.
 

 And it’s not like you can’t express yourself in smarter, literary, sophisticated sounding terms. You could say how that wooden, ebony night had left you feeling aimless among lacy, white curtains that strained the light of the moon upon your closed, tear stained face, creating a façade that was dissimilar to the one you adorned everyday in the unforgiving sun. Something like that.
 

But being an unclaimed artist, and that, too, a self-deprecating one was a tiresome task. So the plain, common language, originating from the tip of the tongue, was much easier for everyday grievances such as these: describing an ordinary woman’s life who lived in secrecy, opening windows into everyone’s minds, struggling with truth, and unable to express all experiences, despite (or in spite of) the selection of different languages available to her. See: trading a heavy heart for a lighter one is sad; sad simply because of having to do it. But having access to two hearts, now that’s what one calls a fool proof plan, the solid Plan B, an ultimate back up! Or rather, the source of hopeless optimism and terrible acting. 

​

Either way, it’s truer than all the other sentences written in the heat, trying to express in some manner a heightened sense of emotion which lies a little to reality and scoffs at those who understand things differently, or perhaps even better than the frustrated writer, who wrote simply seeking a response: a critique of some sort. 
 

 That writer probably often thought back to that movie ticket which was paid for and technically unused, wondering about that moviemaker who was unable to sell his material, unable to command attention for even that relatively short period of time. And that, mixed with insecurity, led to other thoughts. What if only a select few would ever understand a particular piece of work? Like that painting that was bought by chance of incomprehensible affinity; that artist who she would never meet, but who would likely become best friends with that voluble dinner guest, if they’d ever meet. Or maybe not?
 

Whilst staring out that same window a thought was thought that hit the glass and bounced right back into a mind that forgot it right away. 

She closed her eyes and waited for sleep.