A Lesson in Leaving

When I was very young (the actual age eludes me at the moment), I got it into my head that I was going to escape my current life and run away to something far more fantastic. It was during one of the many time-out sessions my mother subjected me to, after I had done something too mischievous to be ignored, that I was forced to sit in my room and think about my actions. Several moments into it I was staring at the wall and contemplating the utter cruelty of the situation when the perfect solution popped into my head.  Of course! The only logical way to dramatically escape imprisonment is through the second story window. So I got all my bed sheets and hastily tied them together, throwing one end of the make-shift rope out the window with the other attached to my bed post. In my head the romantic notion of fleeing out the window was necessary in this situation. And at the very least I’d be known for daring escapes and clever schemes.

 I suppose you could blame it all on too much television, but really the stupidity was all mine in thinking it would work.  And while for an instant the thought of falling crossed my mind and made me hesitate, the idea that my mother would feel terrible for punishing me and give me ice cream and hugs and lots of well deserved sympathy did enough to stifle my fears almost immediately. Overall I saw it as a win-win situation.

                Luckily for me I had forgotten that my door didn’t lock, and just as I had one little leg dangling out the window my mother walked in unexpectedly. In a split second I saw her facial expressions change from confusion to shock, followed by horror and then anger. I can imagine I had that deer-caught-in-the-headlights expression as she ran over and pulled me back into the room temporarily deafening me with that high pitched mom-shriek I knew so well. The rest is a blur with exception of the many time-outs I received afterwards all of which were supervised and far less interesting.

However, my desire to escape didn’t subside after my first scheme was thwarted. I’m not entirely sure what I was looking for, although I do know that I wanted my family to be completely devastated at the loss of me, and abundantly overjoyed at my triumphant return as a worldly and important person. The impact it would have on them was far more critical for me to achieve than what I was going to do when I was gone.

  So I decided that my next plan would involve direct honesty with my mother. I would tell her flat out that I was leaving without any possibility of being talked out of it and she would just have to accept my resignation from the family. And of course once she heard that I was leaving to make my way in the world she would not only admire me for my courage and strength of will, but she’d be heart-broken that she ever punished me in the first place for anything. She’d drop all of her grown-up duties and have tea parties and play dress up, and let me touch all of the breakable things in the house just because I was safe and at home. I was dead certain that this would work.

With a lot of deliberation I packed up my little pink suit-case with the necessary acourtaments: Barbies, a cup and saucer for tea, a hair brush, I think a toothbrush, and absolutely no articles of clothing. Sighing heavily I took the time to say my goodbyes to each and every stuffed bunny and bear and dog in my room before closing the door on my old life forever. And with my head held high I marched down the stairs and announced “I’m leaving!” It was my moment of victory… and there was no answer. Ok maybe she was preoccupied.
When I finally did find my mother she didn’t seem as affected as I would have liked. In fact she seemed to be taking things far too lightly for my liking but at least I had done my best to get my point across. I vehemently stated that I was moving out and if she needed me for anything I would be living on the porch from that point on (because that was about as far away as I knew to go).

After a half an hour of sitting on the front steps my Barbie dolls got boring and there was simply no tea to drink. I sat there scowling at the idea that another plan had failed, and my mother probably knew it all along. Why hadn’t she come out and begged me to return? Where were the tears and exclamations of grief? It just didn’t make sense to me. I packed up my little suitcase, adjusted my facial expression so that she wouldn’t see defeat, and marched back through the front door. No one was there to greet me but I knew she’d be listening so I proclaimed as authoritatively as possible, “I’ve decided to return.” In which my mother replied, “Glad to have you back.” It completely threw me off to be honest, because I was glad to be back too.

Greek Revenge

Tread lightly here, 

avoid the Erinyes power

And live with just a speck of hope that they will not find you.

Ah! Alecto heard the words, she cursed you, 

And with her sister Tisiphone,

Cast a mighty reckoning upon the minds of men.

You will not sleep.

 Bia comes, when wicked strike, 

Chaos when they are weary

 Nyx, hides in the shadows of an endless night.

There is a feast for the friends of Fate when you walk in the room.

And me, dainty as I am

holds the hand of Nemesis.

I watch and you learn.

Illusory Reality

Love…that messy business which brings us close together and tears us apart has sucked the life out of me. I can feel it in between my rib cage somewhere behind that organ that pumps life into my body, and it twists and turns and beats its broken bits against my insides reminding me that I am completely vulnerable to its vices. Some would call it sadness or melancholy. Others might say its depression and all the unsavory feelings that go along with it. But in my mind love displays so many sides of its character that it is all of these and more wrapped up in one all-encompassing little package. It has a mind of its own and a desire to wreak havoc on unsuspecting hearts.  And it burrows into my body with a ferocious voracity, trying to eat away at my strength. I have no peace in love, and none of that sense of calm which is supposed to manifest itself with good and honest things, because earthly love is a deceiver of sorts. It cannot be what it was designed to be. Perfect love, on the other hand, is something entirely different and only comes from one source. And we as humans foolishly try and simulate it with each other like we know what we are doing, but we always fall short no matter how hard we try. As always we try and become our own masters and fail over and over and over and over….

Its simulacra, an illusion; a figments of our imaginations. We start out as babies without the knowledge of the evil infestation that occurs in our natures. Where we were once ignorant of ourselves there becomes a certain realization that reality is what we make of it. It is in the stories we read, the shows we watch, the smiley faced beautiful people on the billboards who stare passionately into one another’s eyes. It’s what your mother tells you, and what your partners show you. And pretty soon this little fledgling creature that resided so innocently inside you begins to grow into a monster, fed by all of the nonsense you take in. And no matter how hard you try to stifle it the damn thing keeps on putting pressure against your insides, squeezing your resolve to death. You fight as long as you can, wrestle with it, cry over it, stomp that sucker right into the ground with sheer force of will. Until one day you wake up with your head in your hands and realize that you have been defeated, and struck down violently with a torrent of feelings all associated with that creature sitting stubbornly on its thrown…love.

It is a drug of immeasurable strength for everyone. Even the most cold hearted of people assume they know what it’s about and are subject to its power. There are the moments of simulated bliss that occur with love and make you feel like you could literally fly off the surface of the earth and touch the sky. I have been high with love, drunk with love, mindless in love and all of the cliché phrases that people have created to show just how addictive it really is. There were times when I believed that I was super human because of love. I literally could do anything and be anything and go about my life like I was walking on air because of this new found thing I’d discovered. At that point I literally felt it skipping gleefully around inside me, dancing with delight and planting little pleasures into my head. It would come alive when I heard certain songs, and produce all kinds of artistic works that would pour out of my mind in tidal waves. I guess you could say the good times make a fabulous muse out of love. It showed me the world in a perfect rosey hue, and I longed to feel it pulsing with life and touching every part of me from my fingertips to the very ends of my toes. Like most drugs it possesses an amazing sense of magic at first…and like most drugs in wears off and you are left with this thing all alone and unrequited.

These days my heart has become completely infected with it, but unfortunately for me it’s brought along a couple friends to join the party. There is bitterness and anger, both of which keep quiet stewing in their own juices until the most inopportune moments when they explode and cause a fury of feeling. They are best friends with chaos who likes to cloud my judgment and make it seem like I will never be free of this ailment no matter what I do.

Then there is worry. It absolutely won’t stop treading back and forth across my stomach to give me a moments rest. Way back in the good times worry went by a different name, “Butterflies,” and appeared during the very highest peaks of elation. I welcomed it then, but now it just makes me feel sick all the time.

 And lastly there is hope which is perhaps the cruelest of the crowd. It sits there timid and unassuming wrapped in a tiny veil of light among the gloom. Hope is one of those things which is the most deeply motivated to change in response to the actions of others. With me it only takes a word or two to set it off, and there I am hoping things will change, hoping for the future, hoping to recover that high I once felt.  Or it could go the other route and steadily grow dimmer until there is nothing but a tiny burning ember in the dark recesses of me. It never fully goes out but it never fully recovers either.

I am a victim of love just as much as anyone else and yet I feel like I am a uniquely tragic case. I suppose we all feel that way which is part of the problem. No one wants to share their broken and bruised hearts anymore. No one wants to take what has been mutated and distorted and make it right again. We would all rather hide away with the pieces of ourselves tightly locked behind a bunch of nasty feelings. It’s like we all have our own array of soldiers somewhere inside our souls standing watch in case someone comes and tries to correct the problem.

Perhaps love isn’t the problem at all. Sometimes I sit back and I listen to it whimpering pitifully inside of me, and I realize that love is just as much as victim of this world as I am. We need each other just to get by. Like two old battle scarred friends who have been there together and seen it all, and can look back and tell old war stories. We both know what it means to be lost and found, misused and misguided, slaves and vagabonds. Love knows what it means to be manipulated by unseen evils as much as I do. I cannot see my nature, but I know it exists to do me harm. And at the same time, love knows as much as I do the Author and Finisher of all things. It is aware of the One who created everything, and the perfect model by which it was created to reflect. In knowing this we both share a bond that cannot be broken no matter how many paths we tread that ultimately lead to nowhere. Perhaps one day love will make sense to me. As for now, I simply hope that this day will come quickly while I wait in love and human brokenness and wonder about the mess I am in and how to survive it.

New England

                                                   NEW ENGLAND

                                    Lady of leaves changing I see it on your face,

                                    Your somber smile is melancholy, a bit broken.

                                    A twinge of sorrow moments and

 foreign children.

My back aches from trudging through you.

                                    But here’s to you Lady,

And your Italy, Ireland, Hungary and Russia.

                                    You’re infested with mice and men.

Brimming full on slimy shore,

that Big Apple core.

                                    Mixing pieces of patchwork people.

                                    But I’m willing to give you a shot.

                                    Brown babies, red boy, yellow girl, cream and roses,

                                    Am I close to you?

Stay awhile with the locals

and maybe you might know me too.

                                    I heard they got some slot machines in the

                                    American jungle.

                                    I see your wrinkled face, but do you have a name?

                                    Who is the lighthouse keeper?

                                    The little black boy at the corner store?

                                    Squatters and speedball dealers had stories once, names.

.                                    In tents and shopping cart houses,

                                    Mr. and Mrs. Nobody could have healed you.

                                    We could have changed the world.

Willow

Beauty

I will love you out loud,

Truly

Not a moment wasted,

Wanting

Just a few more hours,

Found you

By the naked flowers.

Tender are your tendrils,

Creature

Silent is your ebb and flow,

Movement

of a silken sillouette,

Moments

Capture come and go.

Leave

A little to remember,

Mark

A piece of bark, a limb,

Root

Reminders of the ages,

Scraped,

 and scratched upon your skin.

The Practice of Stillness

On a day like today all should have been well. I woke up at 11:30am, sauntered around in my pajamas and had an unusually good cup of coffee. The sun beamed through the windows and birds were chirping cheerily to one another. A faint breeze brushed against my bedroom window. I was half expecting some cartoon sparrow to twitter at me from the windowsill a Disney-inspired song. It was a wonderful beginning to a much needed day off where I eagerly planned on doing nothing.
     Problem is doing nothing is not in my vocabulary. Too much down time and I begin to get antsy.  For the first few hours of relaxation I started to feel the beginnings of a guilty conscience kicking in. Another hour went by and I was preparing lists of things in my head that needed to be done. Glancing at the clock I planned out the day in a sequence of events that must be accomplished in order for the day to be "successful". By early afternoon I was very busy relaxing.
     I did 3 loads of laundry, went to the gym, cleaned the kitchen, paid all the monthly bills and organized my dresser drawers by color. If there were more hours in the day I would have probably organized something else in the house just for fun. It's like a high almost, this business of doing things just so I won't have to stop and think about what else I need to do.
     Now it's early evening and I am completely exhausted wondering where the day went. It's not an entirely bad feeling though. In one sense I feel like a good day is a productive day where all the little ends get tied up to make me feel complete. Taking a moment (just a moment) to rub my feet I thought back to yesterday. It was miserable outside, raining, cold and overcast. I literally split my time between lying in bed, and staring out the window miserably. I was completely depressed, feeling like a waste of space. I convinced myself that a lack of busy work meant weakness of some sort. If I am physically weak I will procrastinate more. If I procrastinate more I will become lazy, and if I am lazy I will never amount to anything. And if I never amount to anything I will be a worthless human being. Somewhere in all of that warped logic the world ends. Yesterday I was convinced I was contributing to that very thing.
     But what seems odd to me is that all I want is to go back to the way things were in my early childhood when all I did was enjoy moment to moment. As far back as I can remember I was always busy doing something, but I didn't necessarily have to. I remember going to bed one night excited that tomorrow would be another chance to just be me. Of course children don't have responsibilities aside from minding their parents and learning about life. There isn't much else to do other than have fun. So the need to keep going is more of a want than a drive to some sort of perfection. And for me somewhere along the line that want to keep experiencing life was replaced with a need to slow down, and an inability in knowing how.
     My profession is therefore absolutely perfect for me. I work in a field where every minute is filled with doing. Most of the time you're trying to keep up, and when you're not it's still your job to keep yourself on your toes. Standing around is not a luxury you can afford in a restaurant if you want to be at the same speed as everyone else. Breathing is actually difficult at times too. At home I tend to forget that these things are allowed.
     When I was in college (the first two attempts) I was blissfully unaware of the world of adults. Although suffering from a host of ailments that inflict most young people with no direction and a lot of freedom, I didn't seem to notice when money flew out the door, time was wasted on bad decisions, and opportunities were lost. Then I got married and busy work took the place of any dream that I might one day be something important. I was a dutiful housewife, always cleaning and always patching up whatever was broken. I was in control of every little business that needed to be done. And I forgot how to rest.
    When I got divorced I took this new found ability to do everything and applied it to school one more time. I was impassioned. Be the best, do the best, work the hardest, multitask, don't stop and don't think about stopping. Exhaustion was my friend, hunger was the norm, and every now and then I would hear my ex-husband uttering that familiar military phrase in the back of my mind, "pain is weakness leaving the body". 
     I was praised for steadfast dedication to hard work. I was a machine really. I started looking for little ways I could boost efficiency in every aspect of my life. For example, studying flash cards for an upcoming test while on an exercise bike kills two birds with one stone, or eating celery as a snack actually burns calories rather than stores them and curbs hunger temporarily...controlling yes, but efficient nonetheless. If I got up at 4am instead of 5am I could do laundry before school, regardless of when I went to bed the night before...sigh....it became a lifestyle I didn't know how to be without.
     Now graduated and restless I never know what to do with myself except keep busy. A little while ago I turned off the television and sat down in my living room in silence. Forcefully I willed myself to sit there and do absolutely nothing. Then came the guilt, and then the feverish urge to move. The silence was stifling. I felt exposed all alone in my apartment. Like someone might see that the dishwasher needs to be unpacked and think me worthless as a human being. It's moments like this that I realize I've lost a long-desired peace.
     Closing my eyes I returned to that same place I used to go to when I was a teenager, lying in my room wishing about the future. I was supposed to be something amazing remember? I was supposed to be more, and better, and smarter than this! I work very hard and it amounts to a whole lot of stress, nothing more.
     I open my eyes and breath out slowly to steady my thoughts; even my mind moves too fast. What will it be like when I am 60? Will I sit here in my living room and wonder where the time went, or think about the time I have left and how there is never enough? Will I be amazing yet? Oh to be great, not because you have to work at it but because you simply are. To be you and be fine with it. To be still, and be fine with that too. These are the greatest of lessons, and the least of what I have yet to learn.