Push pins

Push pin in the fabric of time, the tiniest hole- a stab wound really

And we keep coming back here because why wouldn't we?

I look around for exit signs because I remember this story about how this theater was on fire and everyone died because they couldn't get out

and from then on, it was a law.

Show them how to get out. Make sure there's an escape route.

And now even when you go to a hotel or an office or a restaurant or a movie theater, they show you. Red lines drawn over diagrams. Big signs over doors that glow in the dim light. EXIT

If the fire gets to be too much, follow this path

If you're in trouble, here's the door

There's always a way out

unless there isn't.

Back to the push pins, because I was thinking about them first

I have this murder-board. This map of my life. There are tiny holes in it where my thoughts have been. String that connects unconnected things to one another, data points that only make sense to me.

It's a cat's cradle, but with a story. There are words I have to write in order for those push pins to have meaning. They don't know how important they are to the story. Or to me.

Each of them has an assignment, a place in time. Each one of them, a wound waiting to be healed.