A mouth on his head
Another on his back
Twice as many things are said.

Some said to the face
The rest said to your back
Like your face is a disgrace.

What kind of friend is that?

I drive away
From the front porch
Of my life
And I look back
Across the almost grey
Dying grass of that lawn
And I can't believe
That I ever stood there
Imagining myself in your place

But as my car
Idles in that driveway
Failing to reverse
Out of that old stretch
Of black pavement
Which used to lead to home
I picture myself

I'm walking across
That raggedy carpet;
Stepping across
That white tiled floor;
Opening up that fridge
And sitting at the dinner table,
Drinking red wine
But then

The gears shift
And I'm turning away
From the only house
You could afford
After your greatest lie
Became a truth

And now
I'm looking towards
A grey horizon:
My life an impossible pattern
Of re-occurring themes:
Yellow lines passing me by,
Stolen grey sweatshirts
Leading me home

And everything
Leading me towards
An uncertain variation
Of present blue

But the road is a loop
And soon
I'm back where I started-
Right back with you
Idling in that driveway
And wondering
How come I couldn't
Have just let
That glass of red wine
Be my last

Sighing slowly I walk
Back into your home
And I lie to you
Like you lied to us because
Across our generations
Lies an entirely
Too plausible
Palindrome

There are lessons that school doesn't teach you
Some things can't be learned by sitting in an uncomfortable chair for several hours a day, tapping your pencil against a desk with your head in your hand staring blankly into space...and if you're like me you have headphones in your ears, thoughts in the clouds, feet off the ground with the touch screen of my phone at my finger tips.
One of those things you can't learn trapped in the four walls of a classroom is that life hits you, hard, in the face, like that first heartbreak...causing an unbearable ache in your chest that feels like you may be entering cardiac arrest.
Your body goes into shock and it's almost like you're in la la land for a moment with a hangover infecting your heart that no type of Advil can fix, until you realize that the person you've thought you were in love with for the past while is no longer that person...they reveal themselves by ripping off their mask of a handsome face to expose a terrifying appearance of sharp teeth and beady eyes, a monster, a liar, a cheater...a heart breaker...
Life waits for you to stand back up only to kick you back down and although you've already fallen seven times and your hearts a little bruised and tattered you stand up eight with a stubborn refusal like the ocean waves always coming back to kiss the shore line no matter how many times it's sent away.
When I was thirteen years old, my older brother taught me something that no teacher could ever have written down in their lesson plan, he said that the number one rule to being cool is to remain unphased, never admitting anything can hurt you, excite you or impress you.
I figure it's like walking through life with your arms as a shield, to protect yourself from all the unexpected miseries or hurt like heartbreak or getting fired or not getting hired. I try to walk through life with my arms and hands wide open...and yes that means catching every heartbreak and each last drop of pain life can squeeze out for me but it also means that when beautiful...amazing things just fall out of the sky...like love...I'm ready to catch them.
I may get an F on one of life's tests but that doesn't mean I can't study for the exam, the bigger picture, because failure is success when you allow yourself to learn from it and that's what I'll do, I will be as open as a book and make sure to write down all of my journeys with no details left out, highlighting the good parts but never forgetting the bad
But I'll be sure to tread carefully because life is as fragile as a bubble but I have to remember that I can't be afraid to stick my finger out and pop it if I don't like the direction it's going in and if popping that bubble means a down pour of miseries, bring it on because my hands are as strong as the suns love for the moon, so stack up my problems like books in a library and I'll read them again and again
And for each new lesson I'll show up with a backpack full of everywhere else I've been, eager to collect another souvenir like the laugh lines framing my mouth or the worry wrinkle etched into my forehead and my heart will come along for the ride, strapped in tight, prepared for all the potholes and sharp turns but there's no air bags aloud so every time we crash there's nothing coming between me and the beginning of a new lesson

Welcome to the ten step guide on how to fool everyone into thinking you're okay

Step One: Smile. Smile your biggest brightest smile to ward off the people who don't know you well enough to realize that it's fake, let your pearly whites be the shield you hide behind so your secret stays a secret

Step Two: Even if the clouds have opened and poured down all the tears you're holding in dress up in your nicest dress so you get more compliments on how pretty you look than questions about how puffy your eyes are

Step Three: When confronted; say I'm just tired, push the fib through your teeth and hope your nose doesn't grow to the size of your lie and make sure you maintain eye contact so they don't catch onto how nervous you are that they might find out

Step Four: Cover up the jawbreakers decorating your skin by wearing a long sleeve shirt even though it's summertime

Step Five: Break out your inner actress, especially when he's around because while he's using your headboard as a punching bag he'll expect you to like it

Step Six: Every time you wanna say hate replace it with love...I love feeling helpless every day, I love being your human doll, I love being camouflaged with purples blacks and greens...I love you...

Step Seven: Fasten your dog collar onto the next notch because he wants you to remember how his hand feels around your throat, he wants you to remember what being scared feels like, he wants you to realize he owns you

Step Eight: Think about what you can do to make things better because as he tells you it's all your fault and he only hits you because he loves you and you're lucky that a guy like him sticks around with a girl like you because you're worthless and you believe it

Step Nine: Let it all out, scream into your pillow and shower off every fibre of him like it's a poison setting into your skin and then cry yourself to sleep to prepare for

Step Ten: Repeat

Dear Boy, I have some bad news for you...even though I know you're the definition of what's bad for me, you are tearing down walls that have taken me years to build and you're not even trying
I've fallen in like and I have no sweet clue if the kisses and cuddling and constant texting really mean a thing or if I'm just something to do but nonetheless my walls are shattering without warning

Dear Boy, you are like my fairy tale come true I mean who goes to the beach at night time to lie on a blanket and watch shooting stars pass above us? Who takes me out to dinner knowing I think he's using a gift certificate to pay fully aware that it expired months ago but that's the only way he could get me to go? Who the hell actually continues a should-have-been-a-drunken-one-night-stand once you're sober? But boy, just like every fairy tale you have to have your villainous traits and I'm hesitantly waiting to discover them

Dear Boy, I promise you, I tried...I really did, I told myself a million times not to think good thoughts but we all know how girls minds work, right? I tried not to fall for your smile...the way you get protective when I bring up my past, the way you sway when you hug me, boy, I tried not to fall but I never knew nice guys existed until you came along and you know that I'm a curious person

Dear Boy, why me? You know your baby blues are hard to say no to...that your touch can persuade me so easily, boy you know I can only go so long without getting my hopes up and truth be told I'm scared of the fact that I'm beginning to define myself by how my outline fits against yours...and how when something's wrong the cure is for me to be wrapped in your arms

Dear Boy, you scare me, I've never fallen this quickly or casually before but it's like it snuck up behind me and I find myself missing you, wanting you, craving you like the cigarettes hidden in my back pocket and I'm left at checkmate, I have no more moves against your adorable attacks but I'm scared...I've been through these 'things' before...you wonder why I don't let you buy me things, it's because they will just be the memories I have to throw out when you abandon me like all the others have

Dear Boy, I have sorta-kinda-accidentally-on-purpose fallen in like with you and I never knew nice guys existed until you came along and boy, you've proved me wrong

*******
It sounds so bitter coming from a mothers mouth

If I have a daughter I will only tell her sweet nothings about how wonderful she is, how beautiful she is and I will never spew the profanities that you've shouted at me because I want her confidence to be as high as the skyscrapers that just skim the clouds so she knows that nothing is the limit

Darling, I will tell her, if someone thinks you're too big for them then they obviously don't have the equipment for the job anyway instead of tagging along on a shopping spree where the only thing I tell her is how that top brings out her belly rolls and how that skirt shows her love handles, I will handle her with all the love I have

I will promise her that I will never say I told you so especially when her first love cheats on her and she comes to me in tears wanting nothing but a hug, I will supply the chocolates, the rom-coms and teach her that the only men you need in life are Ben & Jerry

If I have a daughter, I will never compare her to her brother, I will never brag about only one of them to people I meet on the street, I will never tell her that she should be more like him because he's perfect at everything she's not without even trying...I will tell her she's good at everything I will say she's the best at having the worst coordination, like her mother, I will tell her she's the best at being who she is, I will tell her she is the best at stealing my heart away every time I look at her

So thank you Mom...for teaching me what not to do, for showing me how to break down your daughters confidence, thank you for teaching me what a hypocrite is, thank you for all the 'I told you sos' and thank you...for teaching me how to be a mother