The History of My Heart (Conclusion) by Victoria Meyers (28 of 30)

The history of my heart concludes with hope and longing for the future.

It doesn't really conclude because it still beats here in my chest.

Though it flutters from time to time, it shudders from the memories and the damages and ravages of time.

Still here it beats, inside a great black hole in my chest and the hollow thudding echoes in my bones and my steps.

This heart is weary but not worn out. Resting but not yet done. Perhaps it can find the strength to love another again? Not now, not soon, but maybe.

For now this heart is learning, to love me. Learning to uncover the truth in a memory and the harsh cold reality without breaking. I feed it with self loathing, and memories, and dreams purged from my guts and re-digested truths.

It trembles and quivers with pain and exhaustion. Yet still it beats.

Each new day the tide changes, the burden is lighter. I do not mean to forget the lost ones, who still are trailing my progress.

I will never let them fall further then I can see them, but they are too far to catch me soon.

The history of my heart cannot ever fully conclude alone.

It can end,

Yes; it can stop beating, though it doesn't., even as hard as I have tried to make it stop.

I've pounded at it and even tried to cut it out with a knife.

There it still beats inside that iron box, that great black hole.

My quivering damaged heart begins to glow with hope ever still.  

The Self-Fulfilling Party Planner by Victoria Meyers (15 of 30)

I have thrown a lot of parties and get togethers of many different sizes and magnitudes throughout my life. When I was a teen in therapy this fact came out that when I throw a party; no one shows up.  So my therapist took this as a challenge. Whether to prove to me that I must be exaggerating- which admittedly depressed souls will do- or to give me a happy successful party experience to reset my counter - well... I'm not sure.

In any event he required me to plan and throw not just one but two successful parties. That was a stipulation in the assignment - YES - they were to be successful.

So with mixed emotions and some guarded fear I set about to plan the first of the two.

My guests, who were all from an enclosed circle of influence, got wind of the assignment. So as kids tend to like to be mean and against all odds  and even threat of punishment they plotted against me. All of my guests purposely refused to show up. Not only that but even my therapist forgot to come!  And yes, he had been given an invitation; hand-written and hand-delivered like all the rest.

So my life has seemed to continue to follow this path. No matter where in the world my nomadic life has led me, no matter the circle of friends of which I was a member, whenever I have summoned the courage to throw another shindig- with very few exceptions- no one shows up.

But I keep doing it. At one point in my life I even made parties my JOB. Go figure. What could have possessed me? Somehow deep down am I actually doing this to myself? Or am I still trying to utilize the therapeutic direction of my past?

My party career never took off. Self fulfilling prophecies not withstanding- I still throw parties that no one attends.

Today I attended a gathering that was thrown together in less then three days. Almost no one received any reminder to attend, much less an invitation at all. Yet there were hundreds in attendance. Family members, old friends, new friends, colleagues, business acquaintances and even dastardly teenagers. Their were spouses and guests who may never even have met the honoree at all.

How could this be? This gathering put together in less then three days for a man who felt so alone and hopeless that he had even taken his own life? The irony is not lost on my. It strikes a cold fear in my heart.
It makes me ask questions that are none of my business, but I wonder...
De he throw parties?
And if he did did he have good attendance?
Maybe he never did throw parties and didn't know how dearly he was loved.
Maybe he did but he forgot?
Maybe its normal for people to ignore you until your dead?
It's a conundrum to me.
But I wonder, will this party failure that I am haunt me even into death?

I wish that he had been able to see how much he was loved. Maybe he would still be with us.