Where's my lip gloss?

Invisible....
I sit here, invisible, reading my book in this hallway. Sharing my breathing space with that little black fly that ever seems to follow me.
Doctor's and nurses pass me by wih no hellos....
my world is quiet..yet noise rushes in one ear and out the other.
I read my gardening book, learning of root maggots and meal worms, insect's that devour and slugs that ruin everything...
The things that also appear nvisible at most times but are there nonetheless.
I am surrounded by bugs.
The fly passes me again. I swat at him.
He laughs and carries on as he has for years.
Funny....everyone seems to laugh when you're invisble.
They laugh with each other.
they laugh at a story, they laugh at a joke and then when you ask "What's so funny?"
they stop laughing....and talk over you like you were never there.
They don't even look at you.
The fly brushed my nose.....
did he not see me?
...or was he coming in for a closer look.
Still he laughs as I brush him away.
It doesn't matter that someone thinks your smart, or "Lovely" or that your hair is "fabulous".
It doesn't make you visible...not permanantly anyway.
Invisible.
I fade into the chair I'm seated in and allow the weeds from my gardening book grow up all around me.
I am comforted here....
maybe they will see me if I put on more lipgloss.
mmmm....lipgloss.
invisible but shiny....
like glass!
I'll probably need a good weeding after this.
"WHERE'S MY LIP GLOSS???"

Plain Jane Librarian

"It's nice to see you back to work with your shelving, Jane."

I pretended to smile as I struggled beneath the weight of books I held cradled in my arm. I had found all the volumes I had reluctantly left beneath my bed, after changing my room around.

"What are these, Jane? We've never seen these books before!"

I continued to shelve and reshelve, trying to remember their order for they had not been numbered except for in my memories.

"What are these titles? What do they mean?"

"Yes, Jane. Who are they?"

I wasn't sure what to tell them...knowing the criticism they often throw in my direction. These were books , chronicled by me, of friendships found and lost....and this shelf was thier graveyard. Each spine, a headstone in their memory. A collection of works, so rich, yet tales ending in tragic death.

Titles listed as, Pamela, Tracy, Jennifer, Rae-lynne, Nicole, Andrea, Michelle, , Paula, Sara, Tammy, Marc,Deborah, Noel,Stacy, The Ripplers, and Juanita. Each volume embossed with silver elephants, that when placed on the shelf next to each other it gave the illusion of tail linked to trunk.

"Why the elephants, Jane?"

"Aren't they Pretty?", I asked them?

I used to be the elphant. The obtrusive thing in the room that no one wanted to be around...the invisible elphant that everyone knew was there...but pretended wasn't. The one that took overbearing footsteps and intruded into people's lives without intentionally doing so....but everyone made it clear that I did....

Silver sometimes appears invisible, reflecting light and color, causing it to fade into it's surroundings.

That's what I did.

.....But now immortalized the former friends into the silver form of an elephant. Putting to death the endagered species of friendship. Causing them to fade in the shadows that surround them.

Life becomes quiet in an elephant graveyard.

Elephants will carry the bones of the deceased elephants for miles and miles, grieving their passing, leaving a long line of mourning, a pathway to healing, and the determination to move forward, still.

"Can we read them, Jane?"

"Not today....but, maybe someday , I will read them to you." .......I smiled , reassuringly.

"How exciting!" the librarians exclaimed, chattering about the mysteries encased within as they wandered back to their quarters.

In my heart, I have excavated too many of these cadavers....and my heart grieves...but their order, and their display remind me of something invested in, worthily.

I am saddened at the opportunity to stand in my own elephant graveyard, laying them out in a line, burying the bones of those who once lived in my life, in my heart, in my memory.

Today I leave their bones behind....annd stretch forth into the sun.

I place Juanita on the shelf. The latest of the collection. A deep breath passes from within me. Like lowering a casket into the ground as the preacher says," Amen."

And I turn and let her go.

"I am Jane....and I will begin again...."