Bridges

"We'll cross the bridge when we come to it." Those are her favourite words. For most of my life  I thought it was simply an excuse to avoid any topic which required fortune telling skills that an average person would not possess. 

But now, I see the wisdom in it.

You see, I am sitting on my bed, listening to melancholy music while sewing an excuse of a kaftan and getting emotional. It all sounds pathetic, even cliche, but it makes me think. Think abundantly and generously. Can't help it. I am an emotional shipwreck comparable to the Titanic on the inside. Yet, outside I am hard as my scones. My scones can kill cats. It's an opinion but I'd like to try it out.So, as I was saying, bridges. Everytime I speak of something, some event that may or may not take place in the future, she quotes me those very words.

But, I really can't help it. My heart has this magical capability. In a moment of opportunity to dream, to wish, to wonder, it wanders. It unfurls this magnificent set of wings, unhitches itself from the clutches of my rib cage and flies away. It travels beyond time, faster than the hands of a clock.

I watch a movie about art, suddenly, I am Picaso clad in Prada walking the length of my newly furbished art gallery. I go on a field trip to a court and in seconds I am a high flying litigator, with a killer tongue and a killer pair of stilettos to match. Always and always in a pencil skirt which I can never pull off due to my fat thighs, a tucked in shirt to emphasize my fantasy of a flat stomach and a pair of killer heels. My visions enable me the capability to think for a second or two that I am a highly desirable woman with looks that would turn any man stupid. But then again, with a chopstick and a spool of thread, one could easily accomplish that.

Lara Croft and Charlie's Angels convinced my hypothetical self that I was not only desirable but dangerous. I am lethal with knife, with gun, even with only a feather for a weapon. Frost/Nixon made me want to be intelligent so much so only a man with a beard a foot long could be compatible to my intellectual capabilities. Freedom Writers, Dead Poet's Society and Mona Lisa Smile won my heart over. It sent me down a lane of apple trees in a summer dress with a basket full of papers to mark. Papers with names of people I want to potentially influence. The list goes on, but I hope you get my point.

And then, I met him. There were hard lines and curiously emptiness in his eyes that trapped me and my magical flying heart. I wanted to explore, to discover this treasure chest. Somehow things didn't turn out to be as my incredibly stupid flying heart whispered so. His first words exposed him a boy. He is a boy. A boy as any boy would be. But I am relentless. I am as stubborn as a donkey as any donkey would be. I combed through every conversation, gesture and mannerism. I fed my head's content with possibilities. I swaddled myself in grief whenever I felt ostracized in a company of more than him. I am stupid and it didn't take him a chopstick and a spool of thread to do the trick. 

We'll cross the bridge when we come to it.

Obviously, this sense of curiosity is unrequited. There is no enthusiasm. At least on his part. And as for me, I wasn't at any bridge. This is not the bridge, the bridge I am waiting to cross so that my stupid heart can remain in my rib cage and I walk that bridge with it safely locked up. 

But, will I stop dreaming? I can't promise you that and for the world, the stars and every lollipop in the Milky Way, I beg your pardon, but I will not stop. My heart was meant to unfurl and fly. Though it returns home hurt and bruised, it dreamed a dream that will come to pass when I come to that bridge.