I wasn't always so easily discouraged.
I used to bristle with enthusiasm.
I glowed with it.
It didn't matter if the task was simple, or tedious, or daunting, or boring.
As though on rails, I slammed into each and every task with terrific force.

But I got older.
Things that used to come easily grew slippery.
What I used to do without thinking twice, I found myself over-thinking.
I threw the brake. I ground to a halt.
Finally, I became idle. A left-over husk of a kernel that's already been popped.
I drowned myself with doubts. Hypothetical situations that might never happen.
I lived in fear of what might go wrong.

So I began to watch everything go wrong, as though I was helpless.
I was no less able. I was no less compassionate.
But I had grown wary. Of what?
What was it that, out of nowhere, caused me to slow down?

I guess I looked down and realized that if I fell, I would not be getting back up.

When you're young, you have no worries, because nothing is relying on your success.
So you mess up a math problem. You'll get it eventually.
So you botch things with that cute girl who sits across from you. You're young, you'll get it.
Re-assurance, faithfully, unwaveringly. A safety line should I fall.
But I never really fell, did I? So why am I laying down like I have?

Get up.

Get up.

I worry about everything. I worry that I will fail.

I dread what comes, what I can't avoid. But time, and time, again, it comes, and I miraculously don't die when it hits, because I've been bracing for a train-wreck impact, a force that will really, truly, finally, definitely lay me flat for good.

I close my eyes, and brace. But the crash never comes. The silence that was continued to be.

I turn behind me, but there's no train there.

I'm starting to realize, with relief, (with horror), that maybe all I needed to do was step off the track.

I look down, and realize, with a first-creeping then-howling laughter that I was never on the track to begin with.

I look off where the track is. There's no train there, either. Maybe there never was.

Maybe there never will be.

She buys herself so many pretty things
like shoes and purses, underwear and rings
A pride in her appearance she does take
but cries when once again alone she wakes

Perhaps is not the way she looks that counts
the frustration of her loneliness starts to mount
In time she'll see her attitudes the key
and a nicer person she will start to be

Cos it don't matter if your pretty,
well dressed or even rich.
When push comes to shove
a ***** is still a *****.