Tag: adaptation

Through It All, My Eyes Are On You – FOREWORD

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FOREWORD

After this post, he lived until October. The past four years has held so much loss and heartache for my family, so much so that it’s been hard to take in every single next breath sometimes.

I sat with Don (my stepdad) and gave him morphine every hour overnight until he reached for the hand of Jesus and gave up his long fight.

In early 2022, Scott’s brother died suddenly and unexpectedly at home. It tore at my heart seeing the pain that Scott and his parents, wife, and kids faced. About six months later Scott and I had to sit down with my precious daughter-in-love 𝙩𝙬𝙞𝙘𝙚 and be the ones to deliver the news that two of the most important people in her life were gone, her mother and then only six months later her grandmother. My heart shattered both times watching her world fall apart before our eyes. Only three months later my 14-year-old nephew died. I didn’t think I could manage the pain of seeing my baby sister’s world being ripped to shreds without warning. Two weeks after that, Scott was no longer here to help me shoulder grief but was now the unintended and unexpected cause of my own devastation and spiral into the depths of despair and loss. And even after this, we have lost others who have chosen to separate themselves from our lives. Grief hurts and it is true that hurt people hurt people.

If you ever wonder why I talk so much about my grief, know that it is because he (Grief) and I have gotten to know each other on a very personal level; we’re on so much more than a first name basis. Sometimes he quietly sits in a corner and sometimes he screams in rage and agony from the rooftop of my soul but he is always there; even when he hides, he is a constant companion and I doubt we’ll ever really lose touch again, like old high school friends or childhood pals. I’ve tried sometimes to lock him away in chains or behind doors, but he always finds a way to escape his shackles, seething and foaming at the mouth. Now I’ve learned that he remains less volatile, usually anyway, if I just let him quietly walk beside me and try to ignore him mostly, try not to bother him, tiptoe to keep from making sounds that might remind him that he has a job to do, that his journey to destroy is not yet complete. Maybe what I am doing is more like playing dead; if he thinks I no longer exist then why would he continue to exert any effort? But maybe it’s really more like playing peek-a-boo with a baby; he’s still there but I’m just hiding behind a blanket with my eyes closed.

What I do know? What I know that I know that I know – is that I have never been alone with him. Sometimes my kids walk with me. Sometimes my friends. Sometimes my sister, wrapped in her own cloak of pseudo-hiding. Sometimes my mother-in-law or my parents. Sometimes others who have walked the same path. Sometimes my old friend chaos comes to shadow over me, stirring me up in something that keeps my mind diverted to another temporary subject. I don’t even mind her company as much as I used to because her best friend, distraction, always accompanies her.

No matter who else is with me, God has never left my side. Yes, He becomes quiet at times. And sometimes He tries to speak to me but I sit in a corner with my fingers in my ears saying “I’m not listening, I’m not listening, I’m not listening!” just to avoid having to talk about it while I’m playing my peek-a-boo “game.” But other times…other times I run toward Him and hide behind His back instead. Grief looks and looks; I can hear him creaking over the floorboards as he gets near but somehow doesn’t see me right around the next corner. I get a blissfully transitory break from the sharpness of his claws, only a dull ache in its wake. There are times I’ve felt God lift me in His arms, a rush of wind spilling around me as I displace the air on my hurried way up. He swipes me out of Grief’s near grasp just before Grief accomplishes his ultimate goal – to destroy me, demolish my spirit, devastate my soul. That was January of 2024…felt like he got so close that time.

Whether God walks beside me, carries me, or walks quietly behind me waiting for me to turn around, He has never bored of my inattention, my lawlessness, my weeping and wailing, or even my complete attempted evasion as I’d pout like an unruly child in a temper tantrum. He has never walked away. No, He waits patiently for me to return to my roots, the ones I’ve grown in Him over years of being reminded, over and over, who He is and how His arms are really the only place that feels safe.

Later on in my grief, as I shuffled back and forth between bewailing the sorrows of my life and grasping for the sparks of light, the joy that laid within the sadness, I began to truly be thankful that deep roots grounded me here. I remembered that I am not one who grieves with no hope. I was never really lost in the storm (even though it may have felt that way, at times,) because He always knows where I am and has always had the power to calm the wind and the waves if I am only so bold as to remember and believe that He can.

Today I know – I know that I know that I know – He will.

Anniversaries are Supposed to be Happy Occasions…right?

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I didn’t make a post yesterday because I needed, for my own sanity and ability to put one foot in front of the other, to essentially pretend that it was another, everyday kind of day. None of my days will ever be the kind of normal I want them to be again; yesterday was certainly anything but “normal.”

May 10th. One year. A whole year. The longest year of my life and yet…wasn’t he just here yesterday? I will continue to say that I really don’t understand how time works after all of this. Or how it can be that my brain knows he is gone but my heart…my heart still thinks he’ll walk in the door any minute. My heart still jumps when I see his location on my phone and it says he’s home. For a split second, every time, I want to get up and go find him. And then after the split second comes the sinking feeling that he cannot be at our home because he has a new one with Jesus.

Tornados hitting the county, a tree falling and crushing my new baby almond tree, my patio furniture being slung all over the place, and no power most of the day while Lillian was with me kept my thoughts busy in the early morning. We hid in the hallway and played with flashlights with all of the curtains, shutters, and doors in the house closed until the danger had passed, then walked window to window to survey what damage we could see from inside. Soon after, a sweet friend took time out of her own busy, kid-filled schedule to just come sit in our powerless house and talk with me for a couple of hours. We talked about a myriad of things but really didn’t focus on Scott. Oh, I thought about him all day long..he’s in most of my thoughts every day…but I couldn’t really talk about him yesterday. I had wanted to spend the day celebrating who he was but then realized I could not talk about him much at all on this “anniversary day” or I would lose what composure I was managing to maintain, a slim cord wrapped around the bulging chaos of grief that wanted to spill out. So I just kept pretending.

A little later my kids started showing up to hang out while we all waited for power to return at our respective homes. We all laughed at Lillian’s antics, which tend to amp up when there are so many of her favorite people there to watch, and everyone tiptoed around what day it was…or more accurately, around what this day looked like, felt like last year. With no power, no TV or music or phones for distraction, it was a blessing to be occupied by casual conversation with others the whole day.

Luke and Patrice asked me to eat supper with them but Austin and Taylor had already invited me to go out to dinner with them at the beautiful 406 restaurant. They took me with them to their anniversary dinner and then insisted on paying for my dinner and theirs. I didn’t realize last year that it happened on their anniversary. I’ve found, along the way, that there is a LOT I don’t remember at all about those days.

Our power was restored and, thankfully, I was able to get some sleep with the A/C on. Much needed sleep because, although I’ve been dreading the arrival of this date for awhile, what I didn’t anticipate was the 9th being much worse than the 10th this time around.

The 9th, throughout the day, was a replay of what we were doing this time last year. Waiting for him to be called to pre-op. Kissing him goodbye in the pre-op area before they took him back. Telling him I loved him and he was going to be fine; I’d see him when he woke up. Sitting with his parents in the waiting room while he was in surgery. Saying goodbye to them while I was waiting for him to be taken up to a room. Seeing him at 7:00 p.m. And then it got really hard. You see, I never saw him on the 10th. Well, I did. I laid in the bed with him but he was already gone. Re-living, again, the hours from 7 p.m. to 11:43 p.m. was brutal. And then remembering the time from then until 12:45 a.m., frantically pacing a waiting room I had been shuffled to and left alone in, trying to get a hold of people I needed, until doctors came to tell me it was over…life, as I knew it and loved it, was over. And the feeling of the cold wall against my back and my shoulder as I slid to the floor, unable to hold my own weight. No. No. No.

That film has played in my head many times during sleep over the last year but usually, while awake, I’ve been able to redirect myself. There are too many whys, what ifs, why didn’t I’s, why didn’t theys, and the ever present “what else could I have done; what should I have done differently to make them save him.” I don’t have a choice when I’m asleep, until I wake in sweat, but in the daytime I can usually waylay the thoughts, except for this time. It’s like when you think about the Challenger explosion, or 9/11, or the Oklahoma City bombing, and you not only remember exactly where you were and what you were doing at that moment but you can feel the shock and devastation you experienced then. This time I was unable to let go of it until I had walked through much of those hours again. The last hours. I’m sure “anniversaries” are different for everyone but I now know that the anniversary of the day before will always be harder than the day they officially called off the code and delivered news to me. By then, he was at peace…and I was desperately clinging to strands of faith that one day I’d find peace here before I go to be with him again.

Looking back, this year has been a picture of God’s hand at work after tragedy. Friends I’m blessed with rallied around and poured love over our family. Some of those same friends have been very steadfast throughout this whole year, understanding that this wasn’t a pain that would disappear after the visitors and meals stopped coming, after the funeral was done. Financially I shouldn’t have been able to maintain what I have been able to thus far. Many times I thought I may be forced to break mine and Scott’s promise to the kids that I would stay home to keep Lillian at least until her mama finished nursing school…but God. Every time I prayed I could keep the promises that Scott and I had made, every single time, God made a way. While I will have to return to work soon, it won’t be before what we committed to. I’m not sure what that work will be but God has given me a year to heal and learn how to manage my grief before needing to concentrate on whatever my new job will entail. I do not even have words to express how thankful I am for this time.

And Lillian, my beautiful, sweet granddaughter. God knew, long before we did, how much she was going to be needed in our family, the light she would bring in darkest sorrows, the joy she would spread even when sadness seemed to reign over everything, the hope she would sprinkle over grown ups, not even knowing that she was doing it.

I haven’t posted much online lately but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been writing about him. This last month, especially, has given me much to write. Now, though, for the most part, I am saving my words for print. I still have a lot to learn about publishing and a lot of choices to make about how to do this, but if everything goes well, and I believe God is in it so it will happen, I will have a book out sometime this year. I always thought my novel would be the first (and really only) book I would write but this book has written itself in my words but by God’s voice of hope intermingled with my trauma. I’ve decided to finally tell about what happened to my husband and how he died…why he died. I have also decided to add in some other very sensitive subjects about loss, widowhood, and being left behind, that I have written over the last year but decided were not social media material. They’ll be in my book. I’m saying this now because Scott really wanted me to publish my novel. He was proud of my writing, even when I felt like I couldn’t get it right, sounding like I wanted. He believed in me so much more than I ever have. He encouraged me endlessly to do this thing I never felt worthy or capable of doing with any success. I do not care, though, about success in an author’s terms. The success is in completing another thing we had planned to do together. This first book won’t be my Christian fiction novel, although I hope to one day finish the other half of it, too, but this book was born of pain and healing, of loss and still living, of devastation clinging to hope. And it is filled with him.

Today is the 11th. This year has been like a marathon (and I 𝘩𝘢𝘵𝘦 running) with those little tents throughout the race where you stop to drink or fuel up before continuing on. My stops weren’t fuel ups, though. They were days I had to get through. Instead of marking my progress by how many fueling stations I had passed (I don’t even really know what marathoners call them) my progress was marked from one day I made it through to another. Holidays, birthdays, probate dates, and tasks completed. The thing about this marathon, though, is that when I finally felt my chest hit the ribbon at the elusive finish line…it wasn’t the finish line at all. It was yet another starting line and I cannot leave until I finish. But when I finish this one, there’s still only another start again. Every marathon, every year that passes, flows into the next and the next with no end, like some ride that you cannot step off of because it never stops moving so, so fast. I’ve gotten through all of the “firsts.” Now I have to learn how live without just surviving each day. So starts a new year…and God will still be in the outcome.

Not Me

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I’m not who I once was.

I was a “social butterfly” at one time. But my wings have gotten wet. Wet butterfly wings don’t make for easy flight. When I’m around large groups of people and noise, I feel hot pins and needles all over my body. My skin feels too tight, like after you wear tight, not-stretchy jeans to Thanksgiving and then feel like you can’t breathe after you eat until you peel them off or at least undo the button and maybe even the zipper while you pull your shirt down to cover it up. Oh, and by the way, by ”large groups of people,” I now mean something like ten where that term wouldn’t have been used for less than fifty or a hundred people before. I’ve performed on stage for over a thousand before. This person who used to enjoy being surrounded by people is much more comfortable with one or two now.

No one really knows how to deal with this other me. They keep waiting for me to get straightened out and become myself again but I really think that person died when my husband did. I really think I’m not the same me and that the person they used to know isn’t coming back again. Yet, still, no one knows how to adjust; I’m supposed to.

I’m very anxious in social situations now. It becomes difficult to breathe. Often that is because I’m trying very hard not to cry. Nothing has to even “trigger” the tears reflex and that’s another whole part of this different person I’ve become. My husband used to wonder why I never cried. I told him I thought it was learned behavior from being a single mom. I’d compartmentalize things to avoid crying so that they’d never be worried or upset. I just wasn’t someone who cried. Now I cry uncontrollably and sometimes at the most inopportune times. Inopportune, for me, means in front of people, thus why I will struggle to breathe normally while desperately attempting to hold back tears. Who 𝘪𝘴 this person???

Well, now I guess it’s me. And it doesn’t feel like it’s a me who will just go back to being that other woman. The one I barely recognize anymore. The one who laughed to the point of tears of hilarity when my husband tried to raise one eyebrow without raising the other, making ridiculous faces in the process and laughing just as much with me. The one who played the game where you try to talk with a mouthguard in and then talked even a little sillier when it made people laugh to hear it. The one who was everyone’s “mom” at work and had extra chocolate, unopened chapsticks, safety pins, pens, tampons, and Vicks VapoRub in her locker at all times in case anyone ever needed anything at all. I don’t know where that woman went because I’d really just rather be at home, even alone, doing homemade projects I devise for myself to do by myself. I don’t even know if this new person is healthy but I don’t feel sick. I feel like I’m finding some kind of peace in an otherwise untenable situation in which I have no choice but to live.

People keep telling me it’s not healthy for me to be alone so much, to stay home so much. But if it’s not healthy then why do I feel better doing it and feel torn every single time someone asks me to do anything else? I love my children and my granddaughter; I feel joy when they come through the door and when I hug them. I love sitting and just reading books to my granddaughter or listening to her laugh at the dogs. I enjoy sitting with my sister and just doing random things like cooking something and talking. I feel good sitting and having coffee with my best friend, even when we talk through the hard stuff. I enjoy spending time with my mother-in-law, just sitting in the living room and talking about the people we miss. I just don’t love the chaos of noise, and groups, and tornados of activity anymore. Maybe that’s not so bad, right? Maybe the new me is just an introvert, and if I’d always been that way then people would think it was okay. I’m not sure why it’s not okay now.

The me you knew before is not me. Can that just be okay? When the doctors walked down that hallway and said “I’m so sorry…” my heart shattered into a million razor-sharp pieces and my world went black; when I picked up the pencils to try coloring it back in, it was impossible to make everything match the original because you can’t photocopy life. What is here now is different, but I’m still in here somewhere.

Mysterious Gifts & Forward Motion

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Google photos pulled me into a wormhole today.

I probably should have backed out but I couldn’t. I laughed. I cried. There weren’t only pictures of Scott and all of our boys but also pictures all the way back to baby births. People I loved very much are gone. My Granny, my second dad (because we don’t say “step” or “half” in my family,) my beautiful nephew, my amazing husband. All gone in the last ten years. Three out of four in the last three years and two in the last five months. We have beautiful memories preserved in photos of all of them. Some made me smile. Others hurt my heart so much. There are so many moments I wish I could go back to.

My husband has sent me gifts, though, since he’s been gone. No, I don’t see dragonflies and white feathers everywhere. I do see cardinals because he and I put a bird feeder on the window to our side porch when we noticed a male and female cardinal always coming to that brick patio area and pecking around. After we bought the bird feeder and filled it up with bird seed especially for cardinals, they began to come to the feeder every day to eat and allowed us to watch them. We adopted them.

A couple of weeks ago, a tiny baby cardinal showed up. He’s brown right now but I still think he’s a boy because he has the little crown on top of his head like the daddy does. Mama flew up a minute later to join him. He’s such a cute little fella and Scott would have been so enamored of him, that we now also have a “grandbird.” That makes me smile. I’ve only seen the little guy twice, but I’m not as good about watching for them as my husband was.

I’ve blogged before about the necklace I got about a week after Scott was gone. He had ordered me a necklace with his thumbprint on one side and it says “We’ve got this.” on the other. We said that often. It started with Scott who would tell me all the time when I was worried or frustrated, “Baby, we’ve got this; we’ll get through it together.” Although that phrase is bittersweet to me now, and especially was on the day I received the necklace, it’s still a bold reminder of the fact that we could do anything together. I cherish that necklace, that unknowingly posthumous gift, but you won’t see me wearing it often. It’s small and fragile; I don’t want to ever risk losing or damaging it, but it’s always where I can pick it up and hold it for a few minutes in wonderment of the fact that, as he was the one struggling through the pain of a spinal injury, he thought to buy a gift to encourage me. That’s just who he was, all the time.

Another gift that I believe came from him may be a little more cryptic to others. My husband had a fantastic green thumb; he didn’t gift me with that, but I wish he had been able to. Early in our relationship he noticed a plant at my house that was almost dead. Well, it actually looked dead. My sweet Granny had died only six months before we met and this plant was from her funeral. I tried desperately but unskillfully to keep it alive and yet, even when I thought it was long gone, I hadn’t gotten rid of it. Scott said “I can save it; let me take it to my house for awhile.” I literally scoffed at him and said “Okay, go ahead; you’re welcome to try.” I think that I thought if he took it there and then had to get rid of it because it was unsalvageable, it might be easier that way. I also thought that I would feel like I really did everything I could. I did not believe he could save it. But I did not yet know of this particular talent of his.

I always over-water or under-water plants. I’ve killed everything from azaleas to cacti. I am seriously challenged in the plant-keeping department but I love them. I even bought a bouquet of tulips that looks and even feels like the real thing because that way I couldn’t help them die. But my husband, then my boyfriend, brought that plant back to life from the shadowy grips of death and it flourished. When he tried to bring it back to my house, I respectfully declined saying that I would kill it without meaning to. He said, “I’ll just check on it when I’m over here.” and I said “You don’t know the depth of my failure with plants; it would probably be dead before you got back.” So, he kept it until he moved to live in my house while we looked for a new house together. I don’t think a plant has died here since, although some are, sadly, quite close again now that he is gone.

I’ve been amazed, since we moved to our new house, how hard it is to kill a crepe myrtle. I love them because they are gorgeous when they flower. There were three different colors of crepe myrtles at our new home which we bought in January, 2020. One baby pink, one white, and one hot pink. When Scott cut them back, I got so upset. I said “They’re going to die now. There’s practically nothing left!” It seemed he had almost cut them back to half their size. Instead, they bloomed with even more flowers that spring.

Now, I know that crepe myrtles can self-propagate. We have two “babies” that appeared in our yard and have flourished quite naturally. They’re both the hot pink variety. But, within a month of Scott dying, a funny little plant began to pop up inside a square planter that stands just below our front porch steps. As it began to get larger, I thought “that does not look like anything that we picked out to put in those planters.” We had situated them more as giant dish gardens and spoke at length with the greenhouse about what would grow well together in that area of the house, with full morning sun and little shade.

One day I walked out the front door and suddenly realized what it was. It had bloomed with a gorgeous color of purple flowers I’ve never seen before but it was most definitely a crepe myrtle tree. I got in the car and drove up and down my street very slowly a couple of times. No purple crepe myrtles anywhere. I had thought that a seed from a nearby tree must have floated on the wind and somehow landed in that pot, right at my front door, but there were none to be found in that color. In fact, I haven’t yet seen another that color since this one arrived.

I researched on the internet. Hydrangeas can change color based on the acidity or alkalinity of the soil so maybe…nope; crepe myrtles don’t change colors. I don’t know how it showed up in my planter but it has grown to be over four feet tall. Today I decided to transplant it to an area in my front yard where it could continue to grow. That little tree had broken through the bottom of a heavy-duty plastic planter and was rooted into the soil beneath it. Solid boundaries could not contain it’s roots. I had to dig into the soil beneath the planter to free the roots and then break the planter to get it out, but I have re-planted it. There is a bit of browning on it and some of the roots broke but I’m trusting that resilient little guy is going to beat the odds…of having to live in my yard without Scott here.

My husband would know that keeping beautiful plants and trees alive would be one of my worries. I think He and God cooked up an unlikely surprise for me, something to make me smile but that I couldn’t inadvertently kill. (I’m still going to ask the guy who does my lawn to check on it and keep an eye on it for me, though, just to be safe.)

From memory photos, to baby birds, to jewelry, to blooming trees, and of course, to a beautiful granddaughter we eagerly anticipated together, I am learning to look for positive things in my grief. I can choose to belabor the fact that he isn’t here to enjoy all of these things, that the memories will only be just that, memories, forevermore because he’s not here to enjoy and make any new ones with me, but that is not going to help me step forward.

Side note: I have thought long and hard about this subject. This is semantics, perhaps, but I am not “moving on.” At least in my interpretation, moving on indicates leaving. “I’ve reached my top potential at this job; it’s time I moved on.”

I am moving forward. I will never leave my husband behind; he is such an enormous part of me. I am moving forward because sitting in my grief, as opposed to moving through it, is not serving me well. I think there may always be a part of me that doesn’t want to keep going without him, but I am still here and that is an indelible fact. I cannot remain my current age, refusing to move forward into the next year. I can no more choose to stay in the days when he was still beside me. If I must age then I must also adapt to these unwanted circumstances. To do that, I have to move forward, as there is no going back.

Today, I planted a beautiful tree, mysteriously gifted to me, in honor of the gifts that my husband has left with me. It’s just a “baby tree” right now but I’m going to do all that I can to grow it into a full, abundantly flowered, and delightful memorial of who my husband was to me and to the world. As it continues to grow, so will I. The tree isn’t blooming now, as we enter fall and then winter, but I expect extravagant purple blossoms in the spring. I will try my best to bloom into some version of happiness with it.

Bulbs Scott planted for me
My mysterious, purple-blossomed crepe myrtle, freshly planted
Brand new blooms from Scott’s carefully tended roses
I don’t remember what he planted here but I think it’s amaryllis, one bloom left this year.

But I like my head in the sand…what???

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Have you ever found yourself wanting to just drop away from reality for awhile?  Things get complicated or overwhelming or even downright frightening and you just want to disappear from that part of life while finding a tiny season of blissful forgetfulness and enjoyment?  Oh, brother, I have.

I love my children and, overall, my life, with wild abandon.  We deal with trying times (after all, I have a teen and preteen now) and difficult days  but, through it all, they are mine, this life is mine, and I will never cease seeking the answers to why it didn’t go a certain way or how it is “supposed to go” from this point forward.  I know there are times that I have done it all wrong.  Am I doing it right, now?  This is not purposed by self-denigration but, rather, by a yearning for self-discovery.  I think that, overall in my life, I have typically been in such a rush to be happy that I have taken enjoyable moments and made lifelong decisions based on temporary enchantment.  At some point, I look back at said resolutions (and revolutions) and think….”why didn’t I just slow down and try a little objectivity before that one?”  I can actually often look back and remember hearing a little voice inside my head saying “This is probably not the best decision but, well, you’re happy right now; feels good, right?…You can figure out how to be happy again after this happy wears off…”  Ughhhh.  I’m disgusted with the asinine absurdity of that whole idea and yet, yep, that’s been me.  Most euphoria is temporary but it’s circumstances can take much longer to be relinquished than originally embarked upon.

Take marriage for example.  A happy “honeymoon” period is like the teasing and tantalizing effect of a drug.  Exhilaration, euphoria, optimism, mirth and enchantment are your companion emotions at the start.  At some point after that, however, the desire to run away will surface.  Somewhere along the path to longevity, I think we all find ourselves in a spot saying…”what did I get myself into and how can I get out?”  Now, I’m not saying that everyone should get out at that point.  This is just the moment of truth at which you make a decision to stand and fight for it and for a better understanding of how it should work, sit and cower under the feelings of self-pity and self-loathing, or jump ship and run like hell to the nearest exit sign as the fire licks at your heels.  The “drug” wears off and the low kicks in.  Or the hangover, if that’s easier to understand.  And this doesn’t have to be about marriage.  Pick your own analogy and insert here: ________.  Chase high, escape low, ad nauseum with no completion.

I think I often want to spend too much of my time with my head in the sand.  I mean, ostriches are kind of cool birds.  Granted, they have the mental capability of a toddler in a peek-a-boo routine (if I can’t see you, you can’t see me) but they are still regal in their own way.  Or if I take a deep breath once in awhile and plunge my head beneath the water, it is quieter there.  The sunlight glitters across the bottom of the cerulean pool, chaotic noise is dramatically muffled and the weightless feel of the gentle rock, to and fro, of the water is calming.  If I didn’t need to breathe, I could live there…well, except that divas don’t actually like to get all pruny.  But we can choose to take a break from reality sometimes.  The “I need to run!” urge can be settled a little as long as the break is temporary and is not a way to avoid truths.

So, how does one decide whether the current longitude and latitude of life is the vacation spot or the permanent homestead?  I need to learn a long-sought ability to step back from a situation and to veritably see some kind of truth in it.  Is the run-and-hide instinct just a product of my miserable failings prior to this intersection of life or is it a visceral instinct, animalistic and primal in nature but necessary for survival?

(((sigh))) Just new…well, maybe not so new but resurfaced…points to ponder for the day…and night, as it would seem.  Somehow it feels as if a fairy princess dress and tiara with some rockin’ high kicks (sparkly ones, of course) should just fix things.  Diva dreams…

Journeying to Self-Discovery: Being happy even if others try to prevent it…

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Oh, to understand the purpose of some of the trappings of this life. This entire year, thus far, has been a whirlwind of chaotic interruptions to what I only want to become a peaceful existence. One thing I have begun to realize, through all of the disaster-overthrown days that seem to be plaguing me is this cliche’-type platitude that is suddenly making the sense of an unexpected epiphany: You can please some of the people some of the time, all of the people, some of the time, some of the people all of the time BUT you cannot please all of the people all of the time. Right now, I want to be pleased with me, whether everyone else is or not.  Period.

I have always been a “people pleaser”. When I was married (the first time), I didn’t like to make waves. I wanted peace, even if that peace was at my expense all of the time. If it meant that, in order to keep harmony, I had to ignore things that hurt me and pretend I was happy, that is exactly what I did. I didn’t want my children to live through unhappiness and strife. I didn’t want them to have to survive a divorce. I didn’t want to have to survive a divorce. I kept the peace by backing down. One day, I learned that my kids were surviving a terrible marriage and that two peaceful homes, albeit separate, rather than one home with quiet tension that could be cut with a cheese knife might be less stressful for them.

As I went through my divorce, I wanted to get it over with as quickly as possible so that the kids didn’t have to deal with the fighting. I didn’t want to fight. I hate confrontation. So I did not fight. I gave into everything except the custody of my children and he could have anything else in the world that he wanted. That included the fact that he paid no child support and got the land we owned that was already bought and paid for while I received the mortgaged house. I decided that I could raise my children myself and that one day they’ll know I worked hard to be able to provide for them. I know there are those of you who will feel like this was the cowardly thing to do and that I should have fought more my to “make him pay, “ monetarily. I still believe that the kids would have suffered more if during the onslaught. He’s happy, they’re happy and I am capable of being what they need when they’re with me (or even when they aren’t), even if it doesn’t mean that we’re rich or affluent. I still do not regret that decision because I truly feel that they would have been hurt even more for my pushing these issues, no matter how much I tried to shield them from harm.

Today, I am realizing that I no longer want to please everyone. I mean, don’t get me wrong…it does bother me when people don’t like me. That being said, I have learned to look at WHY they don’t like me and ask myself “Is that something that I am willing to change about myself? Do I like that part of who I am or is that a fault I need to work on?” When my answer is that I am perfectly happy with whatever behavior or attitude or verbal exchange that seems to have made the person in question unhappy with me, I can say…”This is who I am and I’m content with that. What they don’t like is their problem; it is not mine.” This is not something that I have ever found myself able to do before. It actually surprises me to have this thought process. What surprises me even more is that being able to do this is not out of bitterness. I don’t have an attitude that says “Whatever. I’m sick of trying to please people. Screw ’em.” Rather, I have a disposition that says “I am going to learn to be happy with who I am. If I am proud of who I am and how I react to circumstances, I am going to be happy with me and others, if they are worthy of my time, will be happy with me as well.” Do you know why this is so? Because there are people who will be jealous or have different opinions or will have been raised differently with converse morals to those in which I was raised. Those people may not agree with me all of the time. They may not even like me. I am okay with that. I am going to strive to be happy with me.

Now, I still regularly make mistakes with which I am NOT happy. I react too quickly to a stressful situation, with my children, for example, and allow anger to overcome good judgement. With my current outlook, however, I find myself quickly assessing my behavior and, when I decide I do not like my own response to the situation, I am able to expediently stop, take a deep breath, and then readdress with a more calm and worthy approach. Being able to redirect appropriately may mean walking away from the scene, rethinking my plan of action for a few minutes before returning and THEN starting over, but I am able to find the person I meant to be in the first place and the one I hope I am the next time something similar occurs. I am also quick to apologize to my children or others involved and let them know that I am not pleased with how I handled the event as well as that I will attempt to learn from it.

Okay, so, in deciding not to please everyone (some of them not even some of the time), I am seriously analyzing who it is that I want to be and how I want others to see me. When I say that latter piece, I actually do not mean that I want them to see me as someone they like. I mean that I am trying to be objective about how I appear on the outside (not physically but just as a human being, in general) and whether I’m happy with that. When someone else looks at me, am I able to be “proud” of the person that they see (whether they like what they see or not…this may be sounding confusing…)? What kind of legacy am I leaving, if you will. I am someone who loves her children with every fiber of her being. However, when I’m in the grocery store and they are all three grating on my nerves, for whatever reason or whichever antics they are displaying, I am likely to address them by saying “HEY! I’M GONNA BEAT YOU IF YOU DON’T STOP ACTING LIKE A BUNCH OF HOOLIGANS! CHILL OUT!!!” Now, some people may hear that and (self-righteously) think, “Man, she’s a mean mom.” or “Oh, my! Listen to how she just yelled at those poor little dears.” Anyone who actually has children, loves them and occasionally loses it (I believe that’s most of us.) will hear it, perhaps giggle, think to themselves, “Yep, been there, done that. She’s having a rough day.” and maybe even think “Way to get them back in line, lady.” If they DON’T feel that way, I still know this: my children know they are not going to actually be beaten, they know that this means I am nearing the end of my rope with them, however, and they also know, based on all of my OTHER motherhood behavior which strangers or friends may not always see, that I LOVE THEM and would do CATEGORICALLY ANYTHING for them. They know I have sat up all night for weeks at a time by a hospital bed, never leaving except to pee (briefly and with significant stress and bladder pressure to ensure it remained brief), as one or another of them was sick. They know that I have hostessed slumber parties with a houseful of ten children and made pounds of pancakes, created and played tons of games, allowed silly messes just because it was fun and found ways to make sure every kid had a good time. They know I have let them sleep in my bed and have picked them up in the middle of the night from someone else’s house, even after I had been asleep, because they were afraid or upset and wanted to come home. My children know the sacrifices I make for them and the things that I do just because I love them more than my own life, itself. If they know this, why on earth would I care what anyone else thinks about this?

At work, I am good at what I do. Occasionally someone does not like the way I handle a situation because it is not the way THEY would maneuver given the same occurrence. I think about how I dealt with it, whether there is a reason that it is not the “right” way to go about it or if a difference of opinion is the real problem. I am using that methodology to decide how to go on from there. Most of the time I am happy with the way I perform my career objectives and have no desire to worry another minute about what that other person’s “problem is”.  I am happy just feeling like I am doing the right thing.   If I decide that they have a point and I have to agree with their viewpoint, I am not reluctant to change tack.

Are you at this point yet? People have told me before to worry about me, be happy with who I am and let others worry about whether they’re happy or not. I am responsible only for my happiness and not that of anyone else (except my children, of course). Until I reached this latest, slow-dawning epiphany, however, I was not ready to understand what I had been advised. If you’re not here, you will be saying “easier said than done…you’re not like me”, in your head. I’m here to tell you that, be it age or wisdom, you will get here one day. If you are here, you understand what I am saying. Pipe up and let me know where you are in your own journey.

Ever-Changing Chameleon

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Chameleon...I am a chameleon.  I’ve been called that in the past but only recently accepted the title and it’s banner.  I change to suit different situations, different people, different locations.  What I’m finding is that it seems to have a negative connotation and I want to respectfully disagree.

Being ever changing is not necessarily a bad thing.  I can understand the concept that one may think of a human “chameleon” as someone who pretends to be something they’re not.  Again, I wholeheartedly disagree.  A chameleon does not pretend to be purple when it’s purple or green when it’s green; it changes.  It morphs into a different version of itself in order to be protected from the dangers of a vicious world; but that, in itself, is the explanation that tells me it’s not wrong.  It changes to a different version of itself.  It is still being true to it’s character, a character that few other species have.  It’s character just has varying faces of the same prism.  And a prism reflects light beautifully.

I am adaptable.  I admit to not wanting anyone not to like me.  Someone recently told me that I need to get over that because you have to turn your back on half of the world to survive.  I respectfully disagree.  I don’t want to turn my back until they force me to.  And even if I have to turn, in the interest of self-preservation, I will still be wishing they had been able to see the better side of me…a different color of the chameleon’s camouflage.  I will still wonder what it was that made our encounter in life one feasting on a bone of contention.  I do realize that people come into and go out of our lives for a reason but I would like to leave each one on good terms yet that is often impossible.

Why?  Because I am human, as are they.  I make mistakes.  I screw up.  I was born missing the critical filter between brain and mouth and I often say dumb things before I stop to realize they are hurtful.  I get angry.  I get hurt.  I say more dumb things.  I am human…hear me cry.  I am the first to admit to how imperfect I am and, trust me, I point said imperfections out to myself on a daily basis.  I often try to talk myself out of them…but some of them seem to be innate.  So, trying to go through life without hurting anyone, making someone angry or resentful or without losing someone who was only meant to stay for a brief while, well, that’s a losing battle.  But I digress…

As a chameleon, I am a different person as a mom, a nurse, a friend, a coworker…and so on.  We all have various hats that we must or choose to wear and we adjust our behavior and affect accordingly.  I’m not saying my character is different, just that I rely on differing aspects of the same character.  And I am a character.   Pretty sure none would deny me that little jewel of a title.

Likewise, in love or around different friends with different interests, I shine alternating sparkles of my complex personality.  With a friend who likes superheroes and “gets” my inner dork, I open up the part that lets my geek flag fly. I will talk about wanting to go to MegaCon and having a (not so) secret fascination with Wonder Woman or Mrs. Incredible.  With a friend who shares my enthusiasm for good wine, I will express my likes and dislikes of a plethora of varieties of libation and ask for opinions about what they enjoy consuming.  These things I do not see as character flaws.  Different people bring out contradistinctive  personality traits in each of us.  Each brings joy or wisdom or even sadness to our lives that individually serve to sculpt the clay of who we are.  And you see, I recall being the same chameleon in high school.

In high school, I attended an international school in which one could decipher no less than 8 different languages in conversations being carried on during one trek down the hallway.  I learned a little bit of Hebrew, conversational German, a good Brit accent (much to my children’s chagrin) and very basic Arabic, French and Spanish.  I would try to incorporate my weak language skills into conversations with varicolored friends in order to sharpen my intellect and, I confess, to cause the random burst of laughter when I brutally murdered phraseology from another tongue.  There was nothing wrong with my trying to blend in with them and incorporate myself into their lives in a meaningful way.  In fact, I daresay I think it was right.  If I change how I react and behave around you, because of your interests or likes vs. dislikes, then you know that you are important enough to me that I want to understand more about who you are.  I want to connect.  I desire to comprehend what makes you tick on a level different than what others have made effort to do.  If you see my character to be different around you than when you’ve seen me elsewhere, please, by all means, take that as a compliment.  You matter.

Being a chameleon, in the respect that I’m attempting to describe, is not the same as when they had a sale on faces at the Dollar Store and some chick bought more than a BOGO.  To those people I say, if you’re going to have two faces, honey, at least make one pretty.  Because in those changing appearances, neither is ever beautiful as they are both tainted by the overall integrity (or rather, lack thereof) of the individual.  No, being a chameleon, in the sense I want you to visualize and condone, is a trait of adaptation, a show of respect, an expression of praise.  I don’t just want to be able to be myself around you but I want to be able to be part of you, around you.  I will watch TV shows you recommend (at least trying on for size).  I will listen to your music; I have eclectic taste anyway.  I will ask how your life is going and will attempt to commune with quips and analogies from my own comical or dramatic history to let you know that you are not alone in the fight.

None of us ever is, no matter how lonely it sometimes feels to be a chameleon in the desert.

The Beginning of My Success

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It is always difficult to begin a new journal.  I stare at blank pages and wonder where to start.  In order to begin, there has to have been an ending.  What has ended?  How does one ever know what “endings” are temporary and what is truly over…completed?  This past year has been riddled with changes and yet I don’t know what of these are starts or finishes.  As odd as that seems, it is but a miniature diorama of life.  I have learned one thing well:  the only constant in life is change.

Even love is not constant and is ever-changing.  The only constant love exists between you and God, who loves as an eternal parent even when you misbehave, and the love between a parent – the worldly kind – and their own child(ren).  This love is one that never, ever goes away, always grows exponentially and never fades…even when you feel it is undeserved.  Children will one day grow to understand this parental love (I hope I see mine grow to know it.) and only then will God’s love make more sense.

All of that being said, I’m looking at this new year knowing that all of the yesterdays have gone and I am left with a pile of total gains and losses to try to place in some assemblage of order so that I can start with a new plan of action.  I am not good with order and organization, however much I would love to be.

Where to start?  I know a few things that I want to be solid foundation in this particular beginning.

1.) I am an independent and strong woman.  I don’t need a man and his affection or love or expectations in order to live, survive and even thrive.  I won’t deny wanting to have someone near to care about me…someone who is there by my side when I am lonely, sick, scared or just plain happy and wanting to share that with someone special who will understand and be happy that I’m happy.  I do not, however, need someone else to make me happy.  I have learned that I am capable of happiness and contentment all by myself.

2.) God is an integral and essential part of who I am, deep inside.  He must become, again, part of who I am on the outside.  I will face challenges of the opinions of others during this conversion of appearance.  I have walked far outside the path of where I believe I am supposed to be. This, it itself, is a personal recognition of need and is not open for speculation or criticism of others.  To stray from my current path in an attempt to traverse rough terrain while laboring to converge with a path on “higher ground” will mean facing sandspurs, sharp rocks and steep, overbearing hills.  The worst of these metaphorical pitfalls are actually other people who seem to love nothing more than to tear down another.  I will walk among them, around them and even right beside them if that is what it takes to reach my desired and, yes, necessary destination.

3.) I will bring my children on every essential leg of this journey.  I always know they are watching me closely; if they can see the struggle of my exploration, perhaps they will be able to avoid some of the difficulties in the trek that I have taken.  I wish for my boys to never have to traverse the thorny fields I have travelled these last years, even though I have learned much and still experienced some great joys in the pilgrimage.

I hold these things up not as resolutions which I believe, by design, are destined to be broken.  I lay them before myself as a map to a new place.  I seek a place of peace, contentment and self-respect.  I want my whole life to have the sensation that I feel while laying in my big, comfortable bed, surrounded by my three boys and fluffy comforters, with a funny movie on the television and their giggles erupting around me.  If my whole life could feel just like that moment, my life could be nothing but a total success.

Nothing to Fear but Fear Itself

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Worry.  Apprehension.  Uncertainty.  Vexation.  Disquiet.  Anxiety.  Doubt.

So many words to describe such a hazardous, emotional behavior.  I have always thought myself to be an optimist but have awakened to a rude new discovery.  Somewhere along the crooked path that has become the road map of my life, I have pulled a light-blocking curtain between myself and positivism.  My rose-colored glasses have become scratched and somehow their shape is warped, seeming to improperly fit my face.  Confidence, exhilaration, self-assurance and even sanguineness all seem to have taken flight as well.  These words, these “things” that once exuded from my very pores and encompassed my whole outlook on life and which also defined whom I was to others, now appear to have waltzed off in some lively dance toward another banquet affair that must have seemed more appealing to attend than my own.  My own soiree has somehow become less enticing to such honored guests.

Now, as I sit like a wallflower lamenting my misfortune at having been the less-appealing option for the ever-sought “popular crowd” of emotions and behavioral accoutrements, I am at a loss for methods of captivating their attentions once again.  How can I lure these seemingly elusive characters back to my daily demeanor?  I brawl daily with the darkened antonyms of my desired disposition, thrashing and deflecting in a fruitless skirmish against intangible adversaries.  I do not know how to struggle against the unseen or to traverse a path around their camp in order to reach my own prior enchanting encampment.  The glow of twinkling lights that identify the convivial mindset to whence I wish to return seem to tease and taunt me from the distance at times, but only when I even become aware that they have been replaced by sinister counterparts.

The metamorphosis of my overall perspective has been so subtle over many years that I scarcely noticed the change.  At one time people would have described me as buoyant, lighthearted, cheerful, spirited and positive.  I most always had a contagious smile and reflected a persona that was repeatedly referred to as “bubbly”.  With these personality traits also came encouragement and reinforcement for others who struggled against despair or even just a plateau of uniformity in their own lives.  I wanted others to be capable of experiencing the joie de vivre that I enjoyed.  I am perplexed by the realization that I am no longer that individual and by the oddly imperceptible journey that has led me here.

Yesterday was one of the days that allowed, nay, demanded that I recognize the transformation of my identity.  Having received news to be thankful for, the fact that I had fretted needlessly over these results for days struck me with the force of a lightning strike.  Minutes, hours, days spent imagining what would need to be done had the outcome been negative.  Everyone battles anxiety at times yet my “old self” would have said “don’t borrow trouble” or “no sense in worrying over what may not be”.  The concerns would have been floating around behind my thoughts rather than taking them over with the rumble of a volcano about to erupt.

Today I am searching for an alley in which to duck until the villainous qualities have dashed past my hiding place and lost me in their pursuit.  I want to stand quietly there until they are out of sight and then scamper quickly in the opposite direction towards my old companions whose company was always substantially more affable and satisfying.  Enchantment, vivacity, mirth and hopefulness must be just down the road, if only I can see the horizon on which the sun is setting so as to get my bearings…

Trudging backwards…wish me luck.