The anticipation begins in the mother's womb. Will it be a boy or a girl? Will it be healthy? What color hair will it have? Will it be bad tempered? The answers come soon enough.

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The anticipation creeps in again. Will I be pretty enough, athletic enough, smart enough, straight enough, successful enough, and my life unravels.

 

My father thrust his penis into my mother’s vagina and ejaculated. That was his part in my life. My father is half of my entire being and he anticipated nothing. By the time I was old enough to understand this, I would hate him. I hate him. I would hate men. I would always approach my relationships with men knowing that they were nothing. I am worth the anticipation.

 

I am a woman, I have red hair.

I am healthy and intelligent.

I am athletic, I am creative.

I am never good enough for myself, so I drink to feel better and drugs are a distraction and no one probably ever anticipated that.

That I would feel lonely and strange.

 

Whiskey and Weed.

Heroin and Cocaine.

I numbed my whole being, half anticipated.

 

"Her poor mother."

 

Women feel safe and they care and they love and they stay.

 

Half of me was anticipated.

 

Vaginas are beautiful layers of skin that I lick like creases of frosting on a cupcake. Vaginas have mouths that sing songs that I dance to.

 

Penises enter my body and leave behind a sticky mess and $100 on the nightstand. And the needle enters the vein and I am numb. Penises are eyes that look to kill.

 

I have been feeling again for 9 months, 2 weeks, 4 days, 14 hours, and 31 minutes.

 

I am feeling lonely and strange again.

 

I anticipate a day that all of me loves all that I am.