I will not sink

I stared at those two lines for a long time. Watching as they began to wobble and blur with the trembling of my hand and the welling of my tears.

The meaning of those parallel little pink lines washed over me like a flood.

My life was going to change in a way I had all but decided I never wanted. I was no longer walking the road I thought I was. The landscape was not what I thought it was.

The nights of numbing escape from my past? The nights of drinking with that handsome coworker? Had yielded unexpected consequences.

As I sat there, stomach knotted with fear, reality began to warp in my mind. My perspective began to bend and twist in response to this new information.

Decisions began to take shape before I consciously realized they needed to be made.

The creepy stalker ex? Twisted into more than an annoyance. Now, he was a threat to my family.

The blurry carefree nights of stress numbing? Melted into a dangerous health hazard.

My 1-bedroom apartment suddenly shrunk and filled itself with pointy, toxic choking hazards.

My income was now squeezed into inadequacy, failing to stretch itself to the new boundaries soon to be required of it.

A list began to materialize in my mind. My doctor must be called. Prenatal vitamins must be purchased. The handsome coworker must be informed. The income must be stretched, expanded, or perhaps even supplemented. The stalker must be eradicated.

I knew there were other things, but I allowed those to remain fuzzy at the outside edges of my thoughts.

This whole baby thing? Was completely alien to me. I was an only child with no experience with children. There was so much I didn't know. The immensity of it all threatened to suffocate me with its weight.

As it happens so often in my life, I had been shoved into the deep end. Without warning and without the knowledge I needed to swim.

But as it happens so often in my life, I would refuse to sink. There might be splashing, flailing, coughing, and spitting. It might be ugly at times. But I would not sink.

Even as I watched those lines tremble, I knew I would not sink.




Assignment: When meeting someone for the first time, describing a scene from your life that would help show the person your true self.