This is Why I am a Hoarder
I kept the little orange flag made out of a flimsy toothpick and a ripped orange sticky note with my name "Lauren Tung" written in heavy ink; like you had put a whole lot of effort into writing these little words on such a teeny, tiny sliver of paper. I remember seeing that flimsy flag like it was yesterday, you were an important figure, untouchable. I was just someone there, someone unimportant, someone who you had no need to show kindness to. Yet you saved me the "world's best" cookie-dough cupcake, or so you claim, and stuck a little flag in it so the world knew that that cupcake was mine. I came to pick it up, confused on why I had been called in. You thought it was no big deal, but I couldn't believe you left it for me. Stars in my eyes, I wolfed that entire cupcake down. That cupcake was good, but, that day, I decided that the flag you had left me was better.
I kept the gum wrapper in arabic. It smells like Dubai. I can't quite explain that night. A humid, hot summer night, our skin had been sun soaked, our hair smelled like hotel shampoo, and the man in that black vest had just wheeled in a cart of food with a singular rose that sat in the middle of us. I was bright red. But you, you thought that this was right. I mean, of course the night was supposed to go like this. Picture perfect. But to me, the magic was insane. I had never seen it before. I had never had a sip of wine before either, but I swear that night my heart was drunk. Fireworks blossomed throughout the night, and we watched rainbows explode on the dark canvas, as it took everything in me to focus on the flames in the night sky, and not on the ones that were exploding within me. I will never watch the Walking Dead without you. After 5 years, I still haven't.
I kept the note in my pocket by accident. It was raining pretty hard and I never wear this raincoat. It's colorful, with a Mickey Mouse plastered on the side of it. It's pretty embarrassing. I walked out of the frozen yoghurt shop on Nassau Street and felt the paper between my fingers. Confused, I unfolded it. "Hey Juliette, I think you're fine. You really blow ma mind. Maybe, one day you & me could run away :-P" I bursted into laughter. You wrote that down to lighten the mood the day after she had gone to heaven, and I couldn't help but laugh in my moment of darkness. I laughed, because you always had a way of turning something so terribly ugly, so terribly horrible, so terribly tragic into something so beautiful, something so funny, and something so full of light. You filled my life with sunshine. When I put on that jacket, forgetting that that note is in there and forgetting about the sunshine, I'll feel it in my pocket, open it, and let the world be bright again.
I kept the ribbon from prom 2016, the white corsage you gave me. The little flowers dried up and pressed in between the pages of my notebook. It still smells like a fresh rose. I don't think I have thought about that night in a long time. I was happy. The happiest I ever thought I could be. I was in love with the world, and the world could do no evil. The world was full of good people, people just like me, who thought like me, who wanted to love harder like me. We danced because we wanted to, we danced because we were best friends. You told me that I looked pretty that night, but I never knew how you really felt about me. We've been best friends for a long time now, untainted and protective of one another till the end of time. You were my knight in shining armor, the only person in the world who understood me. You were the only one who thought about the world in these bits and pieces like I did. You were the only one who thought about the veins of the world too, the atoms, the mysteries, the parts that made no sense. You were the only one who saw the world in pixie dust with me, the one who flew up so high with me, holding my hand, looking down at the the tiny houses and the ant people like we could never understand them. We went to the moon together, because that's the planet we knew where we belonged... But the white flowers pressed in between the pages of my notebook look bruised, and black seems to outline its veins.
I kept the disgusting poster. Ripped, wet and folded so atrociously, the folds are even starting to lose their color. White specks on the poster were created when the misplaced strips of tape were carelessly ripped off of it. The word "United" is barely made out. I can't even remember the night I got this poster, but for some reason, I can't seem to throw it away. I watch myself salvage this beaten poster every year, laying it carefully on each stacked to the brim box, and taping the box shut. I watch myself tack it up on my wall year after year. 6 years later, it's still here. I went to that concert with the weirdest girl. We aren't even friends today. Everyone had their hands up and I couldn't understand what they were doing. It was like they were filled with something so passionate, so real in their chest, like a spirit had taken over their heads and their hearts. She stood there with her wavy red hair, hitting notes I never knew you could belt like that. I stood there flabbergastered. I've never seen a love for something so out of this world, so willing, so trusting. I want to love something that hard too. I kept that poster, I think, because in that moment, I found out what it meant to love.
I keep them all. The memories of you, the small acts of kindness that you never even knew that you did. I keep the moments that remind me that the world is good, the moments that make me remember why I want to keep existing, why I want to fall in love. I keep the moments that you forget. The moments that never seem to matter. I keep the moments that we tuck into the back of our minds, the magic moments we never even knew existed, and the ones that we look back on and make us hurt and ache, too. I keep the good and I keep the bad, and I bring it all with me, drag that bag of memories down the road because those little moments, have shaped me to become who I am today, through mere moments with you. What you do matters, and you never know how a moment, how a single seemingly useless moment can make someone's world. You gave me moments that I will never forget, that I look back in my moments of failure, of eerieness, of greyness, there is a reminder that the world is just a little bit more beautiful. There is a reminder that people are beautiful.
I am a hoarder because I want to remember it all. I want to hold on to it all.
I am a hoarder, and I am - #proud.
You are never alone, lovie.
- teeny, tiny & terrified
I kept the gum wrapper in arabic. It smells like Dubai. I can't quite explain that night. A humid, hot summer night, our skin had been sun soaked, our hair smelled like hotel shampoo, and the man in that black vest had just wheeled in a cart of food with a singular rose that sat in the middle of us. I was bright red. But you, you thought that this was right. I mean, of course the night was supposed to go like this. Picture perfect. But to me, the magic was insane. I had never seen it before. I had never had a sip of wine before either, but I swear that night my heart was drunk. Fireworks blossomed throughout the night, and we watched rainbows explode on the dark canvas, as it took everything in me to focus on the flames in the night sky, and not on the ones that were exploding within me. I will never watch the Walking Dead without you. After 5 years, I still haven't.
I kept the note in my pocket by accident. It was raining pretty hard and I never wear this raincoat. It's colorful, with a Mickey Mouse plastered on the side of it. It's pretty embarrassing. I walked out of the frozen yoghurt shop on Nassau Street and felt the paper between my fingers. Confused, I unfolded it. "Hey Juliette, I think you're fine. You really blow ma mind. Maybe, one day you & me could run away :-P" I bursted into laughter. You wrote that down to lighten the mood the day after she had gone to heaven, and I couldn't help but laugh in my moment of darkness. I laughed, because you always had a way of turning something so terribly ugly, so terribly horrible, so terribly tragic into something so beautiful, something so funny, and something so full of light. You filled my life with sunshine. When I put on that jacket, forgetting that that note is in there and forgetting about the sunshine, I'll feel it in my pocket, open it, and let the world be bright again.
I kept the ribbon from prom 2016, the white corsage you gave me. The little flowers dried up and pressed in between the pages of my notebook. It still smells like a fresh rose. I don't think I have thought about that night in a long time. I was happy. The happiest I ever thought I could be. I was in love with the world, and the world could do no evil. The world was full of good people, people just like me, who thought like me, who wanted to love harder like me. We danced because we wanted to, we danced because we were best friends. You told me that I looked pretty that night, but I never knew how you really felt about me. We've been best friends for a long time now, untainted and protective of one another till the end of time. You were my knight in shining armor, the only person in the world who understood me. You were the only one who thought about the world in these bits and pieces like I did. You were the only one who thought about the veins of the world too, the atoms, the mysteries, the parts that made no sense. You were the only one who saw the world in pixie dust with me, the one who flew up so high with me, holding my hand, looking down at the the tiny houses and the ant people like we could never understand them. We went to the moon together, because that's the planet we knew where we belonged... But the white flowers pressed in between the pages of my notebook look bruised, and black seems to outline its veins.
I kept the disgusting poster. Ripped, wet and folded so atrociously, the folds are even starting to lose their color. White specks on the poster were created when the misplaced strips of tape were carelessly ripped off of it. The word "United" is barely made out. I can't even remember the night I got this poster, but for some reason, I can't seem to throw it away. I watch myself salvage this beaten poster every year, laying it carefully on each stacked to the brim box, and taping the box shut. I watch myself tack it up on my wall year after year. 6 years later, it's still here. I went to that concert with the weirdest girl. We aren't even friends today. Everyone had their hands up and I couldn't understand what they were doing. It was like they were filled with something so passionate, so real in their chest, like a spirit had taken over their heads and their hearts. She stood there with her wavy red hair, hitting notes I never knew you could belt like that. I stood there flabbergastered. I've never seen a love for something so out of this world, so willing, so trusting. I want to love something that hard too. I kept that poster, I think, because in that moment, I found out what it meant to love.
I keep them all. The memories of you, the small acts of kindness that you never even knew that you did. I keep the moments that remind me that the world is good, the moments that make me remember why I want to keep existing, why I want to fall in love. I keep the moments that you forget. The moments that never seem to matter. I keep the moments that we tuck into the back of our minds, the magic moments we never even knew existed, and the ones that we look back on and make us hurt and ache, too. I keep the good and I keep the bad, and I bring it all with me, drag that bag of memories down the road because those little moments, have shaped me to become who I am today, through mere moments with you. What you do matters, and you never know how a moment, how a single seemingly useless moment can make someone's world. You gave me moments that I will never forget, that I look back in my moments of failure, of eerieness, of greyness, there is a reminder that the world is just a little bit more beautiful. There is a reminder that people are beautiful.
I am a hoarder because I want to remember it all. I want to hold on to it all.
I am a hoarder, and I am - #proud.
You are never alone, lovie.
- teeny, tiny & terrified
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