Wait to cross.

I feel like my life has been a constant voice at a stoplight telling me to wait.

And, impatiently, I want to go.

I am like a child that runs blindly into the street not knowing any better; not knowing the dangers that cars and streets hold.

There’s a hand that is holding me back every time I try to run across.

I keep getting closer and closer and closer to hitting the cars and

every. single. time.

I get yanked back.

And that little voice in the stoplight, says wait.

And it’s not a voice of anger or frustration or discontent.

No, it is just a monotone voice.

It is very steady.

It is very consistent

It’s tone is the same.

It is the same.

Every. single. time.

I live and strive for adventure.

It fuels me.

It entices me.

It keeps me on a high.

And, inevitably, I always come back to the non-adventure.

The mundane.

Which is my every day life.

The life that I live here, the life that I live at my job, the life that I live at school.

Most especially school.

That is all non-adventure or, at least that’s what I have made it seem to be.

Why do I need the adventure to be fueled? Why do I need the trip to be exciting and not where I am now?

Why is contentment so hard for me?

Why did I think that I conquered that struggle long ago, and yet it’s still here.

Why am I never happy with what I have? Why is everything that I’ve ever put even a slice of my identity into ripped away? But isn't it always.

I have built myself a suburbia.

Now this suburb is not like a normal suburb. It is Hope suburbia.

Every street, every corner, every turn, every sidewalk, has excitement.

The ground sings when you walk on it.

The wind smells like pine.

The sky is always blue and sunny.

Clouds look as through they came straight from Dreamworks.

And if I ever was to venture, no, not even venture. If I am placed outside of my suburbia…

I am frustrated.

Easily agitated.

Angered.

All of the things that I know, or thought that I knew, I am not to be. I turn into someone running stoplight s trying to make her way back ‘home’ to her suburbia that she has built for herself.

The streets.

The corners.

The sidewalks.

The clouds.

All of it is slowly being taken away.

Pavement ripped apart.

Houses stripped down.

Anything that I had built myself into, slowly being shredded.

All the specs of myself that I put into each of the planks of wood of the homes that I lived in; are broken down.

I am slowly having to find those specs and put them back into myself. Without the home. Just me.

And so I have come to a crossroads and somehow, surely not by my doing, a voice has been built into the stoplight.

A voice that is consistent.

A voice that is even toned.

A voice that never changes.

A voice that stays the same every time I’ve come to this crossroad before.

And this voice has not only built itself into this one crossroad of this one stoplight, but every single stoplight that I’ve built in my suburbia. And every time I come to it, it tells me to wait.

Wait to cross.

Wait to cross this next season of your life.

Wait to move on.

Wait to date.

Wait to finish school.

Wait to start a job.

I have been told to wait so. many. times.

And who knows how many times that wait has saved my life.

Who knows how many times the cars come racing past the yellows in the lights with no care for a child who just wants adventure.

Cars with no knowing of all the times that I’ve had to wait before.

With only their cares and their adventure on the horizon.

That they too might be so caught up in their own world of suburbia that I almost die in my world of suburbia because of their‘s.

Because my world was also on the horizon at one point and it was all I could see and thought what I wanted.

So here I am. At a crossroads again. Being told to wait.

And I don’t have the strength or the energy to fight this one.

I don’t have the willpower to tug against the arm that is pulling me back.

The emotion and the feelings that go along with waiting this time are tiring.

Wait to cross into the next stage of your life.

Wait to finish this semester.

Wait to go to camp.

Wait to finish camp.

Wait to graduate.

Wait to start your next season of life.

Wait wait wait wait.

Sometimes, you say a word so many times and it doesn’t even sound like a word anymore.

I think that is where I am. Not knowing what the word wait even means anymore or how to do it.

Wait doesn’t even sound like a word to me anymore.

But I am still waiting.

This won't be the last wait.

All I can say is I am thankful for the voice at the crossroad that says "wait to cross."