Toes

There are few things that my toes like more than digging into the sand, snuggled wool socks, pavement in the sun, hot springs after cold hiking boots, slippery rocks in a river, a chilly puddle, burrowing into mud, waking up to a warm bed, or dangling off the dock to ripple the water. My toes, however, find themselves cooped up in a sock, cooped up in a shoe. They don’t always live pervasively. They don’t indulge in Life’s delights day in and day out.

My toes share a similar position with my heart: cooped up inside my chest cavity, beating tepidly, providing minimal heat to the rest of my body and those around me. It’s not aches, pains, moans and groans. It’s the transition from torrents of water, to a drizzling brook. I love the intricacy of friendships, camaraderie of family, an intimate faith in God, a sudden birth of romance. But I suppose Love doesn’t birth itself without labor.

My heart finds difficulty plunging into pleasure when it’s cooped up inside my humanness. My “humanness” consists of everything I do that does not apply to my purest vision of “perfect” life: running errands, school and work stress, dealing with financial issues--the mundane, or the “blemishes” of life.

The heart is naturally—primitive. It’s more instinctual desiring a game of scrabble with my mother over working a ten hour shift, or having a drink with an old friend over scheduling a plumber. I miss the primitive.

My toes get sweaty and anxious when they’re inside my shoes too long. I suppose it doesn’t take a brain surgeon to realize that my heart feels the same.