They Don't Tell You That - Poem

They don’t tell you about that day.

The one you will question everything you are and, what you became, and where you will go.

Where the world seems to stop for a moment, and you are uneasy about the motionless.

It will be on a Tuesday mid-morning,

At around 11:12 AM,

On your lunch break,

As you eat your chicken McNuggets with that sweet and tangy sauce for the third day in a row.

You would have gone to Panera Bread, but that is expensive, so you are now in your leased Nissan, which you overpaid for, eating the golden fries and McNuggets.

As a pop song from your childhood comes on the radio and is deeper than you remember it being.

You know the song.

The one by that girl who only sang that one song, that wasn’t even that big of a hit, but is now a classic on the pop station you listen to because you have now gotten to the point where new music scares you.

Pop songs aren’t supposed to be this deep.

It is pop, for Christ’s sake.

Nobody tells you about the flashbacks and the regret you have then.

How you are supposed to deal with all the wrongs you made, as you are alone, and there is no one to witness your agony.

Maybe you should have stayed with that boy you met in college.

Remember his name?

He was nice.

A little weird, but he was nicer than other guys you met.

Maybe you should have been a nurse instead of a teacher.

Or hell, maybe you should have done something else entirely.

You sit there as you sip away your large Diet Coke and notice the shades don’t hide the darkness under your eyes.

Exhaustion has become a good friend of yours.

You didn’t think that it would be the closest friend you had as you enter your thirties.

My god, are you really that old?

You want kids, but you also want to be with the right guy, but how do you find that guy?

Most men are pigs, and the ones that aren’t pigs are losers.

How about James?

Eh, he is alright, but is he the father of your children?

That last thought requires an extra sip and dip.

What if you continue to have fun like you always had?

If the party doesn’t stop, then there is no way for it to end, right?

Eh, even you can admit that the days of you drinking and going to work on 2 hours of sleep are over.

Damn, since when has living become this hard?

You lived your whole life up until this point without worrying about slowing down, but now that seems to be the only thing you are good for.

Once you become a Mom, that is it for you.

Then the kids take over your life, and everything will be about them.

You will have to monitor them all the time.

All the time.

You don’t even monitor yourself that much.

What if you are not that good of a mom?

What if you become a mom that other moms talk badly about?

Or what if your kid is a problem?

Like he is really stupid and needs to study extra hard just to pass,

Or worse…

What if your kid is ugly?

You are getting ahead of yourself, since there is no guy to even have those kids with, yet.

Which is as frightening as it is sad.

Life is passing you by as you sip away at your Diet Coke, and the sauce cup becomes empty.

And let’s not even talk about the mess you made with the sauce that you had to clean up before turning on the radio.

You always make the mess in the one place that it is inconvenient to make a mess.

You can’t make a mess that is easy to clean up for some reason.

No, you somehow make a mess that goes right in the middle of the seat, in the spot where you drop your phone sometimes.

Now, there is a whole layer of sauce on the side of your passenger seat.

When you decide to clean up your car in about half a year, you are going to find a fry or two.

You are fine, though, right?

Yeah, completely fine.

You are uncertain of your place in the world, your hands are slightly trembling, a tear comes down your face, as you sink your head into your breasts, but you are fine, right?

Is this what it is like for the world to catch up to you?

For the world to tell you that you are no longer the girl you used to be?

Your hairline is receding, although no one but your Mom has said anything about it.

You are definitely going to have to get extensions by next year.

Your girls aren’t doing that much better, either.

They used to be able to hold up without any help.

Now you need a bra just to have them where they used to be.

Is this what it felt like for that teacher in South Park to get saggy tits?

No, you are not her.

Not yet.

Is that the ultimate fate for you?

Teach a classroom of pain the ass kids, as your boobs sag on the floor.

It’s official: you are becoming the cat lady, and you haven’t even bought a cat yet.

You want to scream, but you don’t know what for.

Nobody is dead.

Nothing is happening, as the parking lot is as empty as the Dunkin coffee cup you left on your dashboard.

You chose to go with French vanilla instead of hazelnut, and that was really your downfall.

The stupid bitch there gave you a medium instead of a large too, and by the time you noticed, you were already in the parking lot, the same one you always go to for lunch.

How hard is it to know the difference between the two sizes?

You are crying, but you can’t even say why.

It is not like you failed.

You did alright for yourself.

You got your job.

You got your family.

You got your life.

You should be happy.

But as you hear that pop song play over as you bite another McNugget, you can’t help but bite with a tear-filled face.

There are some women in the world who can’t even speak up for what they do.

Like in Pakistan, or Iran, or some other country where there are a bunch of Muslims.

Don’t those women get their vaginas ripped up for even thinking about driving a car?

Plus, aren’t there African women who are starving and have to walk a million miles to get some water?

That’s not you.

You have your vag, and you have never needed to walk across the desert with a jug on your head for water.

So it’s not all bad, right?

Your mental collapse, your psychological breakdown, your neurosis, is not that bad compared to other women’s problems, right?

Right?

You feel down.

You feel defeated.

Like no matter what you do, there is nothing there.

No happiness.

No joy.

Nothing.

Damn, do you think your happiness left when you stopped texting that cute boy from college?

Maybe it was when you chose this career instead of the other?

I bet it was when you got your French vanilla coffee from that dumb bitch who doesn’t know large from medium.

Where are you to go?

Who can you talk to?

All you have is a brown bag from McDonald’s, as a sign of your nervousness.

What are you to do but finish the fries, take another sip of Cola, wipe away your tears, and act as if this never happened?

You weren’t just sitting in your car during your lunch break having a nervous breakdown.

If anyone asks, nothing happened, and you are fine, right?

Right?

They never tell you about those days.

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