i can't tell you. i have to tell someone. i can't tell you because you will fall apart and i am no good with a needle and a thread. i have never been together, i have accepted this. it does not make it any easier to be responsible for the unravelling of someone else's heart strings. a life. i do not want to be responsbile for your sadness. you know i am terrible with endings.

i sometimes don't read the end of a story because it is easier not to know.

this shirt didn't fit me five months ago. i am simultaneously pleased with myself and terrified that i am going to spend the rest of my life trying to achieve some ideal size and appearance that is unrealistic for me. i am not so young anymore. even when i was the end results of my efforts have never been enough for my brain. i will never make myself happy focussing on this strange body i am inhabiting. at least i am clear on that now.

the plants are doing well, all things considered. it seems as though the life has drained out of the african violet. i secretly hoped it would not relent to the winter light deprivation, as i have. just a little less green, now, a little less vibrant. i know that the spring will find us both a little less dismal. it's the months between now and then that concern me. the pitcher plant is still hanging on, resting on the top shelf of the window greenhouse that it calls home. i think he'll be okay. i was worried.

i like to watch the turtle bask, in the evenings. i sometimes imagine myself into his little turtle head. i hope he is happy enough, despite his circumstance.