The irony of being an anchor is that the house expects you to be still, but the mind never stops screaming. I am the silent provider of a thousand unearned comforts. I guide, I provide, and I’m the designated dumping ground for everyone else’s emotional baggage—yet I can go days without anyone asking a single question about me.
I’m currently 'The Anchor,' but the anchor is tired. The pets get the best of me because they’re the only ones who look me in the eye when I’m filling the bowl. Meanwhile, my own dreams are gathering dust like that unfinished mural. I’m the foundation of a life I’m barely allowed to live. If you’re looking for the woman I used to be, she’s probably under the sink, looking for the Windex.
Running Still
Images flicker, thoughts collide,
Desires drift on a restless tide.
Actions spark then disappear—
All of it pulsing, loud and clear.
A mind in motion, never still,
Spinning faster against my will.
So much to do, no time to spare,
So much to write, so much to share.
But the world waits while I lie here—
Caught beneath the weight of fear.
No steps taken, no words said—
Just dreams running, but I stay in bed.
This internal chaos is amplified by a very specific kind of external labor: I am the designated metaphorical punching bag for everyone’s undigested emotions. But the real kicker? I’m currently losing a beauty pageant to a piece of glass and silicon. My lover spends his life in his own world with his actual lover: his phone.
I’ve reached a level of lunacy where I am genuinely jealous of a soulless object that receives more affection and eye contact than I do. This is the agonizing reality of my self-sacrifice: I mold myself into every shape needed to keep the peace, while being consumed by the terrifying question: Does anyone here actually remember that I have a life of my own? Or am I just the charging station for everyone else’s reality?
The Luminous Paradox of Loneliness
There’s a specific kind of loneliness that hollows you out—the kind where you’re lying next to a devoted partner whose passion for their “calling” has left you in the nosebleed seats of your own life. We talk about “single” loneliness, but nobody mentions the agonizing distance of being a “Background Character” in a long-term partnership.
The work of the Bearing Wall requires me to maintain a facade of capability that I’m frankly tired of funding. I’ve become a whisper, a presence so quiet it’s easy to overlook because I’ve stopped asking for the bare minimum. It’s a survival instinct, really—hiding the messy, dark parts because I’m pretty sure the cost of admission to my actual head is a price nobody here is willing to pay.
So, I keep the currency locked away and pretend I don’t mind the silence. It’s either that or start charging rent for the space I occupy in the void.
The final, paralyzing irony of the bearing wall is that I am anchored here, not just by love or duty, but by the terrible, exhausting labor of keeping my own painful truths hidden from the very people who might save me from the fall.
The Insightful Observer 