Unravelling

I feel as if I'm unravelling

My thread of life, falling away from that thick, warm, safe, soft ball of wool.

All I thought I knew and was certain of,

all that I built my foundations upon,

falling off my lap,

onto the floor,

rolling away from me.

The life I thought I knew

the life I had

the life I was living is all there, contained within that bundle of wool.

The routines,

the early morning calls,

the responsibilities and the self assurances of the man I thought I was

Coming apart at the seams.

No, not coming apart,

This is no passive, inevitable collapse under gravity.

This is decisive, this is intended, this is planned

I am doing this to myself.

I am consciously picking myself apart.

At some point,

some distant point

very early on in my design

A mistake was made.

They didn't mean to do it,

it wasn't intentional,

it wasn't their fault,

But a mistake was made.

An error in my code.

A dropped stitch.

Isn't it too late to fix, to make amends?

Half-way through this project now

Can I bear it?

Can I survive it?

Live with the flaw, or unpick 40 years of work?

But I know

at some point,

Some distant point in the future

When this project is nearing its end

I'll feel that flaw

that embedded defect

And I'll know

I'll know I had the opportunity to make amends

To fix myself

To make myself anew

In my own design.

So I'm unravelling myself,

and I hope,

and I pray

There's enough of me left

Once I've come apart

To put myself back together again.