I used to keep a cookie sheet under my bed and burn stuff on it.
Before you freak out (mom), my pyro stage did not last long. I was much too afraid of burning the house down. I loved the idea of burning stuff. Striking the match. I loved the smell, the disintegration of the paper, but then I would panic when a piece of ash flew upwards and I’d extinguish it before I could get my full pyro high. The cookie sheet was probably back in its rightful place before my mom’s next batch of peanut butter cookies. But I think I was onto something then.
Burning something is freeing.
Years later things are different. Now I keep my negative feelings under there. I remove them from my brain before bed, tuck them carefully under the box spring, but instead of burning them I store them up like it’s a deep freezer. Preserving them. So in case anyone asks I can say, “See here’s all my baggage.” Freezer burn and all.
Not super healthy I’ve realized.
My 10 year old self was wise. I got out the old cookie sheet, sat quietly in the backyard and set some shit on fire. I emptied the metaphorical freezer I’d created under my bed. I wanted my dreams to be free, to be infinite, not burdened with the past. I still panicked a little bit when the ash flew upward, but for different reasons now. I didn’t realize how much I was holding on.
So I let it go.
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