I remember something from science class.
The moon is a piece of the earth itself, cleaved in an act of cosmic violence. Was it also in the wrong place at the wrong time?
I used to have a job. My job was imagining things. This was called freelance writing. Then something happened I could not have imagined. Someone ran out of beer.
Then she stole a truck, careened over a curb, and crumpled a car. I was in the car.
The car looked like crumpled paper.
For a few years, I woke up each day and wondered if I had emerged from a really bad dream or had really been hit by a drunk with a truck. Then I wondered if I really broke my brain. The answer was Yes.
Writers create something from nothing. Or rather from the alphabet and any images that come to mind. Which requires a mind. I lost my former life and my former mind.
Then? I sounded like what you’d get if you stirred three heaping teaspoons of something with a cup of something else (metaphorically, I mean) — if it survived and you could un-crumple it. I looked like that, too. I also couldn’t read or write, but other than that, I was fine.
In an instant, I was unemployed, also due to the drunk with a truck, but eighteen years later, I hired myself to do this job (without pay) and hope to keep doing it. A teaspoon of surprise, a teaspoon of entertaining, a teaspoon of something more. Twice a week.
I've been hit. Hit others. Rolled down embankments. And slammed my noggin into doors and corners. All sober. It's another weird world we have passports for, Judith. We with post concussion syndrome. It takes faith and practice and guidance to reclaim the important bits. I'll think I'm fine, super duper even, then I get exhausted and I can't find my phone (it's in my hand). Sorry sorry sorry the d.i.a.truck found you. May you continue to find yourself in new uncrumpled formats. Keep writing. It helps to heal. Hugs. Cynthia
Please continue writing. For those of us who understand it is important, my friend.