What We Keep

The morning I moved in with Eli, I walked down the stairs and opened the door on a world that existed long before I woke there.  There was a sofa, silverware, and a dog that wagged its tail at me warily. A best friend, a brother, and a boyfriend. A snowy hometown. A Saturday night bar. Like the set on a sitcom waiting for an entrance, it was a whole life that I had merely been written into. A full life, a happy life, one that I am grateful to have been given.

I am living testament to the power of one day, and one person, to change the future you had accepted as imminent. By definition, change - true change - is unlike anything you know, so expecting or predicting what is coming is impossible.

Though, when change came for me again, I wasn't ready. There was nothing for me to run to. I feared everything would leave with the man who brought it to me. That it would all dissolve with the same magic it had appeared.

But everything didn't dissolve. I'm still here. They're still here. The city, shifting and flickering in rain puddles, is still here.

Time is an erratic constant. Whole months stretch out before us languidly, only to snap back upon themselves in an instant. We plan of course, only to plan again; to make room for what has come.  Things are lost, but we pack a box, and hesitantly proceed.

Time decides the wheres and whens. We decide what we keep.