You Said It Was a Renovation

I thought we were renovating.

Leave the place cleaner than you found it.

Work hard, get seen, get chosen.

Set boundaries. Heal your trauma.

Find your third space.

Build community over charcuterie and candlelight.

Take up pottery. Everything will make sense soon.

…Right?

Turns out, the floorboards were already rotting.

We showed up with our clipboards, vision boards, healing crystals, and conflict-resolution skills.

We were told this place could be fixed — the job, the relationship, the world.

All it needed was care.

So we offered ours.

We walked the halls like it mattered.

Noticed the details.

Asked the hard questions.

We saw the storefront closing — the one meant to welcome people in — and asked: why?

“Upper management doesn’t care,” someone shrugged.

And that’s when we realized:

It’s not a renovation.

It’s a slow collapse.

And somehow, we’re the only ones still asking why.

Meanwhile, in the middle of this renovation-turned-nightmare-crumbling, the “He’s Around the Corner” ghost still lingers.

That’s what happens when you put babies in your baby’s arms.

He looks like your almost-lover.

The “aww, so there are good ones out there” guy.

The man who saw us — but never walked in.

He admired from the lobby, hanging around the free section with all the brochures.

Stuffed one into his front pocket like he might actually follow through.

We still try to feel for him around the corner. Not today, but maybe tomorrow. Any day now. Any day now. 

Because we were taught that if we were soft enough, kind enough, exceptional enough — we’d be chosen.

Meanwhile, the building is crumbling.

And we’re the ones patching holes while whispering: maybe this is the moment he chooses me.

We’ve all had a man who saw our light and threw a tantrum.

We’ve all had a man who saw our light and kept it at a distance — admiring, never entering.

The full alphabet of men who taught us what not to wait for.

But here’s what no one told us:

The real renovation was never the building.

It was us.

We are the ones who stayed.

Who cared.

Who kept rebuilding — even when no one upstairs was watching.

And now?

Now there’s a No Loitering sign in the lobby.

Ticket prices posted at the door.

If you’d like to come in, you’re welcome to pay the price of presence.

If not —

you can marvel from the sidewalk,

nose pressed against the glass.

We’re already home.