My Shadow has shown itself just a little darker. Still, it is beyond my grasp for I am afraid to reach for it. What if it will dance away and I will not be left even with what I have now? What if my Shadow does not want anything to do with me? Ah – such teenagery insecurities as I have not experienced before! But perhaps not unfounded, for my Shadow was never as invested in our interactions as I was – or so I’ve always thought. Now that it has drifted away into its own world, it is perhaps because it no longer wished to be a part of mine.
Most of the time, that is something I can bear with ease, but there are times when I just long for the hours spent in my Shadow’s clever company. When everything and everyone seems so dull, that I long for the sharpness of my Shadow, for the way it sharpened me and gave me things to think about or laugh about. I miss feeling like a child, but not in a humiliating way – knowing that my Shadow was cleverer and more educated than I was, but also knowing that I might be so too if I try.
My Shadow always made me want to be better, but never made me feel bad about how I was. I don’t know how, or why exactly. It is as incomprehensible to me as anything has ever been. I don’t understand why my Shadow still haunts me. I wish it didn’t, because it’s hard wishing for something that will probably not happen. And I do. I wish for those days when my Shadow was closer, tangible. When I could reach out in the middle of the night to it and ask it about the meaning of life. Or the best way to cook pasta. I wish for new days like those. I wish I had the courage to reach for my Shadow. But I do not, so I must for now delight in the knowledge that it is still there… somewhere.
A Book Nerd 