Block after block flies by.  My brain is a pile of mush--taken over by anxiety and sleep deprivation.  I'm running fast trying to pound my troubles in the pavement, as if somehow they will travel out through my feet and stay left behind on the cobblestones.  I feel like oobleck, the force of my feet pounding is the only thing that's making me a solid and not a puddle of tears.

I wonder how many more times I'll need to stay up till 3am writing legal briefs, now crafting a case against this or that, then writing support and testimony so I have to avoid being interrogated one more time.  I wonder when I can choose to be up till 3am again instead of having that chosen for me.

Everything in me tries to hold my emotional self together but it's not working.  If I don't let it out, then it comes out physically--the headache that's persistent, the shaking hands as I try to complete procedures in lab while waiting for results from meetings I cannot be present at--because after all I have class--after all I am a student.

The tears that come when I realize a long term flirtation has come to an end are almost a relief.  They're normal; something that I've felt before, that my friends have felt before.  I can't say I'm sad that it ended, to be honest.  It's, like so many of other things, something that's not in my script for life.  But the difference is that I've decided on this script--it's my choice.  Now no one will see the scar, there won't be any covering it up every day.  There's no more pressure trying not to fall for someone or trying to figure out why I'm not falling for this person.  But if there's one thing I've learned, emotions don't come single.  Or double.  They come in droves and it's ok to be confused about any or all of them.

I have to emote.  It's necessary.  It's helpful.  It's normal.  And I'm starting to learn that too.