future-tense

have you ever felt judged by the ghosts of your past or the snickering devils from your future? same

One of my favorite books that I always keep ready to grab from my bookstand is, The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows. It is a book of made-up words for emotions we all feel that exist anywhere on an aches-longing-joys-ecstacy spectrum, but don’t always have the words to express.

I’m fascinated by having single words to describe complex feelings, yes. But what makes this book even more interesting is being reminded of the shared human experience, for any one of us is able to relate to most of these made-up words that depend on our relatability to such intimate feelings.

Incredible how we all live such unique lives, yet feel the weight and nostalgia of emotions we can all find common ground in.

The other day, I felt trapped within a writer’s rut. I decided to flip to a random page of this dictionary, and see if I could find some muse in a new word.

future-tense:

adj. sensing the judgment of your future self looking over your shoulder - chuckling at your well-laid plans or clutching their pearls at the risky move you’re about to make - which leaves you faintly wary of their opinion, even though you know they’d take your place in a heart-beat.

After a few moments of sitting with this word that defines something I feel far too often in my reflections, I was able to let the feather pen flow and write some imaginative prose.

And I hope you enjoy.

---

I close my eyes and imagine: 

somewhere in the middle of a random, vast strawberry field. It’s warm, but there’s also a slight breeze - just the way I’ve liked it my whole life. 

I see little girls, teenage girls, women, mothers, grandmothers.

some of them look similar, like they are siblings. they bicker but they laugh at the same things and dress similarly - like they share a mind.

some of them look like they could be separated by two generations.

some are standing alone, pacing by themselves, caught up in their own boxed world they seem to have made for themselves - even though we are all here together, in the middle of a strawberry field, so vast, so full of promise.

some are together, holding hands, falling asleep in each others arms, just looking at the sky.

some seem lost, maybe perhaps because we’re all out here in the middle of a strawberry field, so vast, so far away from any perceivable exit. 

but from the corner of my eye, 

I catch three of them, 

standing far, far away from everybody else. 

the youngest one has her eyes wide open, looking at everyone simply just be in the strawberry field. plump skin, tender eyes, a small smile that reflects nostalgia, she gazes around.

standing back to back with the youthful one is:

the oldest woman whose face I can’t see whose beautifully gray hair dances in the wind, as she re-wraps her scarf around her head, stares at the open field in the other direction. not a person in sight. just the wind and the bees. 

holding their hands, 

there is a woman looking right at me.

she carries the hurt and the history 

and the lessons and the love 

that the youthful one embodied under her skin and bones. 

she carries fragments of all the imagination and the intimacy,

the wisdom and wistfulness 

that the gray-haired woman contains in all her aura. 

she holds my gaze.

I smile at her;

she smiles back at me.

I know her. 

she is me. 

🐌

the draws have sometimes been expected; 

I know what’s coming, 

I know what to play next. 

but sometimes I’m dealt something I never would have had the foresight to know was coming

and I am forced to play my next card,

and witness turns I never accounted for.

sometimes, I serendipitously find my way back to a known game set-up:

I know what to play next.

so now - 

after seeing how each inexplicable draw leads me to living an even more so previously inexplicable life that could have only belonged to my dreams - 

when the uncertainty of the draw hits, 

I find myself naturally with a gasp and an incessantly tapping foot

from part anxiety, part wonder

at the sheer indefinability of all the unlocked pathways

to come.  

---

I find that posting my imaginative thought scribbles or ‘poetic prose’ on Substack can feel scarier than one would imagine. If I had to take a guess, I wonder if it is because it leaves me feeling more exposed as a writer, like I’m to be judged for how cryptic, original, or well-educated my imagination wills itself to be.

Because this specific piece brought me out of the mini writer’s block spell that was cast on me, I decided to wiggle myself out of my fear of judgment and post this directly from my creative writing journal.

I would love to hear if you all enjoyed reading this piece, if it resonated with you, and if you would like to see more of this type of content. This space is mine, as much as it is yours - and I hope to build it with everything we wish to see - even if it means kicking my fears right in the butt and breaking myself free.