The Russian box

So I got it all wrong, you should be used to that by now. I know that, I know that, I can't ever not know that.

I open up my box, the one that sits on my dresser, and can't help but feel tremendously sad. Everything I touch has awful memories associated with it. I can't take these gifts and wear them, I have to keep them in their box, out of sight. I open it up, and I am sorry, I am sorry.

Every day I walk around campus and see my once roommate. I wish I didn't have to see her. She doesn't look at me. She looks right through me.

She is the reason I have acquired some of my best friends in college. But it wasn't through her agency and I doubt she would have wished it on me by the time I moved out.

She is the reason I have a blue flower in my box. It wasn't actually her who gave it to me, but her best friend. We both loved her. She was funny, and lively, and I loved her. She hated Kate Bush. She was just hilarious and full of life and fucked up.

I see The Friend (friend prime?) around campus and she smiles and waves and gives me big hugs. Things with her didn't spoil but we don't spend time with each other. Last time we talked for very long she said she'd found "religion" but was somewhat vague about it.

The box is from Russia, only with no love. The box is full of hurt. The box needs to stay out of sight. The necklaces hurt, at their worst. At best, they just remind me of friends lost, people faded out of memory. I can't remember Anje, who gave me my purse and Russian and Polish books, and the Russian amber pendant that lies in the box. I can't picture his face, and when I speak of him my parent's grow distant.

Now I just seek out the neutral, the merely pretty, and press the bobby pins into my hair. There is no pain, but no warmth either.

2002-09-14, box

before / after

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