You are okay I say to myself
You are okay
When you get scared again, a letter to the girl who used to be afraid of the dark: it
is okay. You are not a perfect body, you are not a perfect mind, you are fragile, you have
been broken, you are not fully healed, and that is okay. Melancholy cannot be your best
friend no matter how seductive she may be, you must be prepared to fight, you have to
fight, you have been fighting for too long to give up now. Yes, you will be fighting
for the rest of your life, but it will get easier, and lighter. You will get lighter.
People will understand the fray in your smile, they will not be disappointed, you will not
be disappointed. You have a family, do not be afraid to believe that they are it. The
friends you've gathered, they are it and that is okay. You are alone a lot of the time,
and that is okay. You are scared most of the time, and that is okay. You are loved all
of the time, and this is true. You have gotten so good at dividing yourself you have forgotten
what it is to be a full body. You must put yourself back together and experience the
world, you are twenty-two, depressed, overweight, single, orphaned, singer, actor, poet, babysitter,
biracial, educator, woman, writer, vagina-lover, brass poet, woman, young, depressed, and okay.
And that is okay. You were a girl once, and she was afraid of the dark, but you are no
longer sleeping in that bed, that room, that house. This bed, this room, and this house,
have different demons, and that is okay. It is okay to leave the light on. It is okay to
leave the light on to see the monsters, the way they rest coat-hanger friendly in your
closet, to face the darkness with the kindest of auras, the kindest of hands, you were made
to survive. You will survive this. I am sure of it. You have survived worse. I... I am
depressed. And I used to think that if I said it outloud it would somehow become more real,
more tangible, more unbearable, but the thing is, it already was. I was waiting for some
sort of miracle to come and heal this noise but the miracle wasn't coming, so I chose
to chase it. I told my closest friends. I let them hold me. I let them cry for me. I
let them see me and they, they made it so much better. They reminded me why I fight, why
I was given these parts, these hands, these lips, to speak, to hold, so friend, talk about
it. Don't be afraid to talk about it. With one person. It doesn't have to be a therapist,
though there is nothing wrong if it is one. But once it is in the air it isn't any more
real, I promise, because it has already been so real. And it is safe there. In this universe,
because there is a world waiting to consume you. Not the way the darkness does, but the
only way light knows how.
You are okay Say to yourself
You are okay Let me hear you say
You are.