How are you this morning/afternoon/evening?
Really, how are you?
I’m asked this question daily, and I ask these words each day, so often receiving the same over used, under felt, meaningless reply “I’m good thank you” or “I’m fine” when it’s obvious the truth couldn’t be further from the lie. FINE in a different sense perhaps - a little fucked off, insecure perhaps, most likely neurotic and definitely emotional.
I don’t want lies and I don’t want meaningless exchanges. I long for raw and real junctures turning strangers to friends, not the other way round.

It’s midnight here in Perth, Western Australia. This isolated city, kept company by the currents of the Indian ocean, breaths of the sea blowing through the pollution of mankind and meeting me here - it feels more like a large country town, although it’s growing fast, so am I.
I’m leaving in three weeks, and it feels as though I’m saying my final goodbyes to this sleepy city - to my childhood, and the person I once was - and I feel a deep sense of nostalgia from within.

I’ve slowly been composing the pieces of my past together to write a book - a long journey that I’m taking my first footsteps forward for - diving deep into the mindset I once existed in; the spiritual standstill I swayed stationary in for too long.
Journeying back through the past, with pages of paper; written words breathing ghosts back to life with each sentence I read. 

Rewinding to a time I would rather fast forward through, tape over, erase altogether and pretend never happened - taking a grown man to court at fifteen for crimes he committed against not just me, but many. I’ve been reliving my 16th and 20th birthdays in hospital rooms, unable to talk, unable to think, unable to feel… anything… at all.
I relive the night my best friend told me the words that still hit me like a ton of bricks - she slept with my first love, she’s pregnant with his child.
The darkness that once consumed my world teases me with it’s tongue as I toss and turn with memories of words hitting me as hard as the rocks they threw, out of sight from the watchful eye.
Memories of bashing my emotion out through two sticks resounding through the drums I hit for years that kept me sane - a release I long for once more.
The adrenaline rushes through my veins as I remember jumping out of that plane and deciding I would approach all my problems from that angle, above it all, able to see clearly, no matter what clouds jade my view.
Scraping back the dirt embedded beneath my eyelids to discover the truths of the mental institutions I’ve done time at twice in my life. The semi intoxicating trance I once existed in, barely breathing at all.
It’s all the words, all the pieces coming together before me; stories weaving themselves into something I’ve known was apart of a plan bigger than myself since… as long as I can remember, before the picture broke into a thousand pieces, cutting me in two and reminding me what I’m made of.

But, like all things in life, there is good with the bad - this journey through time takes me back to the Andes mountains range - crisp cool clouds surrounding me, looking down valleys and across at mountains, knowing then, as I do now that the physical journey I’ve begun is nothing compared to the mental and spiritual milestones I’ve passed.
I find myself in the waters of islands in the Philippines, lying on my back on the green grass slopes of Austria looking at the skies above, the very same light reaching down from the heavens and shining through me, no matter where I am in these physical and spiritual worlds.

People who don’t know me ask “what could a 22 year old white girl possibly write about that will intrigue another?” and I bite my tongue as my head grows a little weary and my heart gets a little heavy, I turn the other cheek and make a conscious decision to keep on going. Pull through. Do it. I’m going to write the best book I possibly can, not in spite of all those who doubt me and say I can’t, but for me, for the friends that have become family and the family that have become friends - the handful of people whose faith in me has given me wings to fly and soar out beyond the mess my life once was.

And I want to thank YOU, dear reader, for soaking in these very words dripping from my soul, out through my fingers for you to collect here, on this very morning/afternoon/evening, just as they were meant to.
I want you to know, from one friend/stranger (strangers are just friends we haven’t met yet?) to another, that someone out there, in this communion of 7 billion souls gives a damn about you - whoever you are, wherever you are, however you are.

I hope the world hasn’t burdened your shoulders on this day/night, and if it has, I hope you know there are better days coming - like everything real and raw in this world, like everything natural, we need both rain and sunshine to learn lessons and grow, so we can continue flowing with the currents life sends our way.
Dear reader, dear friend, dear stranger I’m yet to meet, there’s a girl alone on this night in the midst of Australia who believes in you. So don’t stop believing in yourself.

All my love, life and light,
Love,
someone at the other end.