On Beauty & the Wasteland - v.2/issue 3 - Pumice

  

On Beauty & the Wasteland

V.2 / issue 3

Pumice

I have decided to give in completely to my picking compulsion. On the way home, I buy the implements: pumice stone, cuticle cutter, metal foot grater (not unlike those one might use on cheese). “I may need a jackhammer,” a laugh to myself, whimsically tossing a vanilla bath bomb into the basket. 

At home, I eat Thai take-out quickly while scrolling the headlines on my phone. Politics, Politics, “What the Lottery Reveals about the American Dream,” “The Murder that Shook the Cycling World — and the Love Triangle Behind it,” more Politics. Not tasting. Hardly chewing. Shoveling it in like I’m burying something. I almost forget what I am planning.

My bag of newly acquired tools reminds me. I am going to pick and pick and pick my feet apart. I’m going to soak my feet, helping the crags to soften, releasing them, or what’s inside. What is inside? I have become more curious about the answer to this question than horrified at what I may or may not find. The question is eating me. 

I run a bath for myself, feeling the smooth plastic of the tub as I climb inside. The bath bomb sizzles and smells, alighting my senses. I run my hands over my coarse feet, my prickly legs, my fleshy thighs. I lean back, knees up tightly together. I feel the hot water condense on my face and breathe in the vanilla scent, allowing myself to consider where the vanilla might have come from. Some exotic far off land? An island perhaps? The rainforest? A slave plantation? 

My breath quickens. My gut tightens like I am going to belch or even vomit, rejecting this intrusion. “What is the carbon footprint of this bath bomb?” Toxic, poisonous thoughts. “Why can’t I just enjoy my bath?,” I pleed. I focus on my breathing, on the warmth of the water, on the sweet soothing scent of vanilla, receiving. I allow my knees to fall to either side and exhale involuntarily. Adrift.

I open my eyes, realizing I’m still in the tub, not sure how much time has passed. The water’s gone cold. I am so tired. I get out, towel off, and climb into bed still naked, arranging myself into fetal position. My fingers find my feet, scratching them gently. Placing a nail into a fissure, I wiggle it a little to see if it gives, to see if I can find my way into or in between or under... 

I am a butterfly waking up to herself encased in a cocoon. A moth perhaps, finding it hard to believe myself to be a beautiful, liltingly light butterfly, flashing with color. I realize that I feel as though I’m in black & white. Like how when you watch old black & white films, you know it's in color, but reversed. Have I always been this way?

Tears soak my eyes and a lump rises into my throat. I release a gasp. I begin moaning softly like a despairing person encased in a tomb for a very long time. I am not a butterfly, ready to be released into a sun-speckled summer. 

I am a worm, crusting over on sun baked cement unable to find the cool moist nourishing earth after a storm. “Be consistent with your metaphors,” echoes a voice off the pavement. “But what if my metaphors aren’t that tidy?,” I struggle to say, red marks scrolling across my inner monologue. As I fall into sleep, I hear the question, “who is entombing who?,” but I do not remember this in the morning.