Someone asked me, recently, if I'd have had this personal growth spurt, if things hadn't errupted at the station.
I replied, too quickly, "if it hadn't been this, it would have been something else."
I got off lucky, I'm thinking.
There is definately an atmosphere that was totally discomboobelating for me.
I tried and tried and tried to fit my square peg in that round hole. I sincerely tried. It was hurting me. I didn't know how much for a very long time.
I'm accustomed to adapting to miserable situations. It's how I've supported myself and kept a roof over my head my whole life. Comes as second nature to me.
If I'd stayed, I'd have had to become so confined, so small, so artificial, I couldn' have done truly good work.
I'm not blaming anybody but myself. I didn't know better. I thought I had to "suck it up," deny my own needs and assimilate.
Making myself small is why I'm so full of rage, panic, resignment....
It's what makes me sick: trying to be what others I've given power over me want me to be.
It's not noble; it's cowardly.
But this shift that's occurring in me is profound: it's fundamental, essential.
I couldn't have done that in an office.
I couldn't have done it in a factory, either.
I wish I could have gotten here without inflicting pain on those around me.
It's my regret.
Ah, this falling in love with myself stuff is hard work.
Digging in to those dark, toxic relics to heal the spaces they've occupied.
I sure wish I had a friend with whom I was on hugging terms right now.
But, I can do that for myself, too.
Maybe it's my old Baptist upbringing. We were trained that, if we were to be good life partners to others, we must submit to the will of god.
Now, I question the notion that the Baptists have any idea what the will of an infinite being would be. And I certainly have no respect for their limited and self serving interpretations of it, especially in regards to women.
But there's something in it I recognize.
I need to submit. I need to humble myself, bow to the Universe and admit I'm clueless, lost and scared. I need to get honest with reality.
I need to devote myself to what places me in reality, not in illusion and distraction.
How can life find me, if I'm hiding all the time? How can I love or be loved, if I'm pretending?
Nothing profound here.
It is a bit of a middle class privilege, this finding one's self business.
Most of us are too busy, keeping the landlord at bay, hauling water, picking pockets, picking vegetables, hustling. Most of us don't have the luxury of naval contemplation. We're too busy, trying to survive.
Oh, my gawd: I'm watching the AFI 100 best songs in film.....
"White Christmas:" "Holiday Inn" version. Dad worked on both movies.
Dad.
Hey, look, I just started working on MOM!
Can't he wait a LITTLE while?
Gawd, Dad loved music! What an EAR!
Well, the song's gone, thank gawd.
I shouldn't blog when these old songs are playing.
Maybe I should...Iso miss my music! I'd kill for a turntable. sigh.
So, I don't know if I'd have gotten real, if the whole world hadn't gone "pfft!" around me.
But here you go.
If I make it, it'll be beautiful.
If I don't, the journey's beautiful, too. Painful, for sure, but beautiful...
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