the mirror

this is the never ending question i continue to ask myself as i write these

songs. as i hear words repeat over and over in my head. as i lay awake

at the early hours of the morning in my bed. all i can do is open logic on

my laptop, put my headphones in and start to sing my thoughts out of

my head, compose these melodies that sound like the grief, longing-

despair, betrayal, obsession, love, confusion, and denial that i felt festering

for the past ten years since you left for the marines and i first wrote you

that letter before going off to Parsons in New York. Before i turned into a

different person; when you were the first guy who ever truly saw through

me and what i was trying to say through my art as an eighteen year old

girl who was up until that point seeking love and attention in all the wrong

places but didn't know how or where to find my sense of belonging or

safety. it was that day we agreed to meet on my last day of senior year.

I had borrowed my dad's car to bring all my art home. we met at the

boynton inlet. i told you i had all my art in the car and you were so eager

to see all of it; the curiosity and interest and admiration from a guy i

found attractive and cool? that was new. i pulled out a self portrait to show

you that i thought would for sure creep you out and make you hav the

reaction i was so used to getting from everyone at that time...but you

loved it. you gasped and cursed and took it out of my hands to inspect it

and said how much you loved it; even yelling at a stranger walking by to

look at it. that describes who you were to me; how you made me feel

seen and accepted and understood for the first time. you were my

mirror. we were both the kids getting in trouble in christian school, always

in detention for rebelling, being too wild and expressive and free; too

unwilling to conform. you were my mirror but when i had to find out the

reason you ghosted me and blocked me after i wrote you a letter during

my first year of college in New York, telling you i loved you and wanted to

be with you was because you got your childhood girlfriend pregnant

and you both got married and had a child i lost my mind. meanwhile

i was living in New York trying to figure out who i am, what it all means

to be an artist, to be able to express myself and realizing that when you

get into the circles higher up in the upper echelon of nepotism babies

doing coke in their million dollar lower east side apartment that daddy

paid for things start to feel pointless. it's christian school all over again

masked in the guise of being around my* people: fellow artists and creatives

but realizing they aren't my people at all. it's being the freak in christian

school all over again, except this time they see me as their kin from the

outside appearance: from the surface level. but on the inside i'm the

kid who wasn't given everything that easily, who was more comfortable

creating from nothing, wearing clothing from thrift stores because

i couldn't afford anything else and customizing it because i wanted to make

it my own, using cardboard out of the garbage as paint palettes

because its free, preferring to spend time around blue collar and hospitality

workers because they're more grounded and in touch with reality and

humble simple people. i realized the world i was so desperate to be a part

of when i was the outsider was just as isolating. i've never felt i belonged

to any one particular group of community even when people think i'm

their kin. that's why you were so special to me. that is why this album

inspired a new trajectory of my musical style, lyrics, story, even my damn

appearance changed all because despite you breaking my heart and

choosing someone else in the end, you still reminded me of this truth

that i fit nowhere and feel unseen and unloved by most on a deeper

truer level.