stopping for a thought

it would have made more sense had it snuck up on me. had it been a slow, gradual kind of thing--approaching from a distance with blinking lights and low whistles.

but alas.

i was in the middle of the restaurant, navigating between tables and people and moving trays on the busiest night of the week when it happened. i stopped. i just stopped, planted my feet and puased.

and there amidst the swarming and moving, time reached elastically around me and i thought, my god, what am i doing?

it was such a simple thought. so clear and emotionless. it was as factual as a thought can be. a fraught-less though, if you will.

and there, paused in the middle of the restaurant in my own sphere of space and time, i thought enough. enough of this.

i have set up my life in such a way as to pursue that which i love. and yet the pursuit has stalled. for fear.

fear. oh, fear.

fear and i are well acquainted. bosom buddies, you might say.

it's just... well, the thing is... fear no longer seems a strong enough deterrent.

because that which i love may not always be clear. and it may not always be easy. but it certainly isn't sashaying to tables in a short black dress hoping that the men don't look too long in the wrong direction.

and so the thought simply was.

(almost as if it had been there all along, just waiting for me to catch up.)