Not To Be Dead

So we dance,
we dance so as not to be dead.
We do not want that.”
— Ray Bradbury, The Illustrated Man

I have had a hard time lately.
Such a very hard time…

All around me is decay,
All around me is heartache.

Nothing is as it seems anymore, and anymore, it seems there is nothing… sane.
The levels of inauthentic and irresponsible behavior have risen off the charts.
No one takes accountability for anything anymore, and the few who do are made to pick up the slack, and bear it all on their shoulders.

What is the point of it all?

Why even try?

Why not just join the masses—they seem to get away with it.

How can this be carried any longer?

My daughter knows.

The three year old Darling that saves my life repeatedly knows.
This tiny healer,
This mini-me,
Has always demonstrated to thirty-five year old me
The exactest and perfectest thing to do
No matter the situation.

She teaches me far more than I teach her.
Whether it is making me lie down so she can do energy work on me, or throwing her arms around my neck, kissing my cheek, and saying of her own accord “I’m sorry I yelled at you, Daddy,” she never fails to remind me of the pureness in life…

This past weekend, we actually got some Daddy/Daughter time alone.
She grabbed the Roku remote, which she fully knows how to operate and navigate Netflix, Amazon Prime, and PBS Kids to find and pick her own shows to watch, but instead went to the Pandora music channel—intentionally.

“Dance with me, Daddy!”

“Okay, Precious!”

And we danced and we danced, as the box with Pandora played the perfect songs, one after another… and we sang and we sang as the words and the music and the dancing and the movement of all the pent-up, built-up, crapped-up energy inside me shook loose and fell out of my eyes—Pandora’s Box melted into liquid form:

If you’re lost and alone,
and you’re sinking like a stone—carry on…
May your past be the sound
of your feet upon the ground—and carry on…

Settle down—it’ll all be clear…
Don’t pay no mind to those demons—they’ll fill you with fear…
Just know you’re not alone…
And I’m gonna make this place your Home…

And I found…

I’m not dead.

We danced, and we were not dead.

We were very much alive.

 

And alive is all I want.

.

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