Why I explain every small decision I make
You order tea instead of coffee and you add, right away, because I've already had two. Nobody asked.
You say you're leaving at 5.30 and you tack on because I've got something tonight. You pick the film and you explain because the other one scares me. The because comes out glued to the sentence, before anyone across from you has even moved an eyebrow. There's something in that, the little slip of paper you hold out in advance, kept in your pocket in case someone asks for it at the door.
It isn't that anyone is asking you to account for yourself. It's that there was a time when choosing without explaining cost you: a silence that went on, a why did you do that which wasn't really a question. You learned to dress a decision up so it would pass. Now you dress it up even when nobody frowns. And you can't say what you want any more without also saying why you're allowed it.
The because isn't an answer to a question anyone asked.
I was wondering…
What would you let yourself want, if you never had to earn it with a reason first?