why do people, do, this?

why do people?

i collect shells and pebbles from beaches. not to take them away in masses. not to keep them forever. i take a favourite in my pocket. i hold it and smooth its ridges with my fingertips. like a human erosion when i’m anxious. one day i will return the pebble to a beach. not necessarily the same beach. but a beach. with the journey of my coat pocket to the wave’s journey, in and out of the seabed. 

why do people do?

romanticised lives are hard to come by i’d say. the definition of romanticism has come a long way. romantic poets would love it. or they’d find ways to criticise it, yet hypocritically speak from its very soul. websites of the most romanticised places in the UK. how do you romanticise your life? do i have to romanticise my life? am i missing out on romanticisation? i feel like it’s slightly pathetic. the definition is warped by its identity. romanticism is defined as idealisation, glorification and the act of indulging in sentiment. but surely that is just the beauty of life. labeling things is a total mess in my opinion. not all things, but the modern definition of romanticisation, yes a mess. live for yourself. not for the romanticisation of it. not for the feeling of approval. just you. it’s used as an excuse to enjoy something in its weirdness, or its hate, or its naivety, or its grossness, or its shame. i love so many things in this life, and i hate many things too, which do i then ‘romanticise’? my love or my hate? or am i just going along with life? feeling every emotion without condemning myself to some sort of restrictive label. am i being too harsh on romanticism? possibly. but is joy then defined as a romanticisation of happiness? someone could very equally say that writing is my romanticisation of life. then i’d have to question possibly even more than i already have. for my peace of mind, i won’t try and understand everything. life is not measured by time. not for me anyway. life and living do not live through romanticisations of themselves. so why do people romanticise? 

why do people do this?

comfort and mundanity keep anxiety at bay without performance. many years ago i thought my heart was going to explode every week. so i had therapy. when my therapist would tell me to list ten things around me. to be where my feet are. to wiggle my toes. touch my skin. hold my heart in my childhood hands and squeeze it. to hold myself as if i was still a child. i would. i found her. it has been easier ever since. that’s why i keep pebbles in my pocket. to weigh me down. i left comfortability and mundanity with that child. i turned them into pebbles that are left at different beaches. they both sit together and watch as the seagulls nick stranger’s chips. they laugh at stupid things because they aren’t worried about what the others are thinking of them. they aren’t being judged. they aren’t forced into an uncomfortable place. they’re comfort and mundanity. sitting on the sofa watching weird youtube videos without being told to grow up. they’re hidden under the seabed of anxiety. comfort and mundanity resemble the colour of deep blue in my life. light just about reaches them, when the sun dries the salt crystals of the pebbles.