When I come across a word I don’t know when I’m reading I write it down with the intention of looking it up later. It is a good idea in theory, but I never get around to actually doing so. I just have tons of little scraps of paper everywhere with mysterious words I don’t know the meanings of scrawled on them. They’re everywhere. I pulled “perniciousness” out of my pillowcase an hour ago and “usufruct” was written on the sticky part of a piece of an envelope and tucked in my bra. It’s insanity. Eventually I try to put them all in a central location, but usually I forgot and they are just left scattered everywhere. I hope I never get into an accident or my apartment gets searched. I feel as though the wrong conclusions of me would be drawn when “loquacious” is pulled out of the band of my underwear or “ultracrepidarian’” is found on an index card in my medicine cabinet.
Today my mom told me I have an incurable case of not belonging. She said most people swing it in their adolescent years but somehow mine seeped clear into my adult life. But I don’t think anyone ever feels like they completely belong, they just stop noticing. It’s like the abrupt but somehow still discrete transition from winter into spring. One day you wake up and it’s warm enough to leave without a jacket, and eventually it becomes so second nature that you forget the transition happened all together. I guess that’s what I’m waiting for — the cold intrusive feeling to lift so I can see what it’s like to live without worrying about keeping myself warm.
A couple just walked out of viewing the house that’s for sale across the street. I guess I’ve forgotten the person who lived there is no longer alive. I remember the ambulance being there once every handful of weeks, then it all just stopped and I don’t remember seeing anyone there until the couple who left just now. I don’t see myself wanting an entire house to myself. All of those rooms and all of those things that go in all of those rooms. I think homes are for people who are good at filling empty space. I just seem to create it. There’s a window still open on the second floor of the house across the street and I keep thinking about what the air must be like in the house. It’s probably the same kind of heavy air that filled my grandma’s house after she died. Everything was still and quiet and every room felt like it didn’t belong to the rest of the house. In some ways I think a house knows when its owner dies and it stays holding its breath until the new ones arrives.
Sometimes things happen and they make me remember memories out of nowhere randomly for what seems like no reason at all. I heard a car outside make a weird noise and I immediately thought of when I was little I got lost at a parade and separated from my mom. I remember my mom standing by a stop sign but I wasn’t able to get to her. A cop must have found me and brought me to her because I can still remember the texture of his uniform and how it felt when it brushed against my face as I buried my head into him and held on to him. I have all of these memories stored but I have no idea why they’re occupying space. I honestly really hope when you die there’s a game show portion of your own life where you have to see how much you remember. People who remember the most get to hang out in the cool parts of heaven that have the most shrimp and top shelf alcohol. I bet heaven is really cool.
