I am about to link you to an image. Before I do that, I need to preface this story and this image by explaining that I did not manipulate the photo or the original composition captured in the photograph in any way at all. To do so would have been unjust, and a bit disgusting. This is a photograph of something just as I found it, in nature.
Last night I came home and the first thing I noticed as I stepped into my foyer (which also serves as my kitchen and bedroom) was a small, furry red heart. I recognized it immediately. It was an appliqué. An ex-girlfriend had adhered the heart to the plastic case containing a mix tape she’d made me one Valentine’s day. This tape is probably seven years old and the heart fell off many years ago, bound, I expected, for an environment better suited to romance. I guess one of my cats had dragged it out of hiding and deposited it by the door for me to find. Adorable, right? I guess that’s why I thought it appropriate to leave it there, right on the hardwood floor. I liked it there, placed accidentally, and wasn’t ready to molest it.
Then this morning, on my way out the door, just minutes after feeding my cats, and running very late for an appointment, I found this. THIS. The heart was exactly where I’d found it last night – same latitude and longitude, but at a slightly different altitude. Something had slipped beneath it, mysteriously. How did it get under there, without disturbing the heart? What kind of sign is this? Why were my cats chosen as the messengers? And, really, what kind of oblivious jackass am I that I require an omen of this magnitude and base simplicity? I’m sure I’m supposed to do something now, something monastic, probably, but in the meantime I’ve decided to simply make a record, clean up the mess and throw my small, vomit-soaked heart in the trash where it belongs.
