Where I Belong

On that first Zoom meeting where I remembered how to speak

Where the words came out easy and playful instead of cracked and uncertain

Where my timid jokes were laughed at

My half-baked ideas answered with a chorus of yes’s and I love that’s

Where I realized that maybe I was funny and friendly

And all of the things I never got to be in my regular life

Sinking into the couch in that steamy living room

Flicking through brailled apples to apples cards and clutching melting ice cream cones

Beaming around at these people I had known

For sixteen years or three months or two days

As the barks and the squeals of two off duty guide dogs and their adoring fan clubs

Seeped through the window crack with the late afternoon glow

Perched on that stool tucked into the corner of the arts center

Fanning brailled bookmarks and pipe cleaners and tactile gemstones

Across a fold out table

Nibbling at weird vegetarian pizza and recollecting the days

When I was one of the kids visiting these booths, all shy and awkward

Bedazzling a gifted bar of soap with the leftover craft supplies

Realizing that even in a small city where I thought I was alone

There are enough of us to fill a community center

Sifting through tea bags and dumping packets of powdered apple cider into paper cups

Hoping the parents wouldn’t be as turned off by the sickly sweetness as we were

Laughter echoing through the empty dining hall

Mind twisting over the ridiculous notion

That I could offer any worthwhile contribution to the upcoming panel

But also an overwhelming sense of pride

To be part of the living proof to these parents that everything would turn out okay

Because I guess that meant that I turned out okay

Scaling a rock wall and clambering down to a beach at sunset

And eating a fair amount of dirt on a capture the flag field

Waiting out a rainstorm with yet another game of apples to apples

Swaying side to side just as a little as we sang “I See Differently”

Just like we had around a campfire at a different summer camp

Nearly ten years earlier

And over those ten years

Things got complicated and then uncomplicated again

But I sort of realized that just like back then

Even after all of this time

This was exactly where I wanted to be

by Acacia