A long, comfy car ride

A microessay inspired by my first wedding anniversary

Love is a lot like creativity in that when you know, you know. And when people say this, it ceases to be this meaningless idiom, an excuse for boring people incapable of harnessing language to depict the transcendence of these primal conditions. Rather, it’s the only true way to capture the overwhelming rightness behind my eyes with both pen and hand in hand. I don’t believe I’ve ever held anything else. Love is like creativity in that they told me both would be hard. They were right but they were wrong because when my husband gives me his sandwich order, I can still ask if he wants extra mayonnaise (which he hates) and he’ll still chuckle at my lame joke and also I can’t tell if this essay is worth a damn and that’s okay. Is this even an essay? I don’t care and that’s okay, too. I often wonder why so many people close doors in their own faces. Why we strain ourselves away from limitlessness in service of a false, vengeful god. My god, which are two words I’ve never written down, creates wind chimes out of shattered glass houses and urges towards the sanctity of rest. That’s why I fall asleep in the passenger seat with my love singing beside me and why I read 20 pages before I shut the bedroom lamp off and say goodnight. I’ve been afraid of my creativity but I’ve never been afraid of love. I conquered the former with gas from the latter and now I breathe fire.

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