Just sayin’
“Don’t walk in front of me, I may not follow. Don’t walk behind me, I may not lead. Just walk beside me and be my friend.”
~Albert Camus
Just sayin’
“I’m very id-driven at the moment. But that’s OK. My id and I are so close… we don’t even need a safe word.”
Ohhhhhmmmmm…..
I’m really trying to be zen about life. I really am.
The problem is that I’m a bit impulsive,
… and impetuous,
… and impatient,
…I hate not knowing all of the answers,
…and have a hard time not being in control.
If I had a mantra, it would go something like: “Serenity NOW, goddammit!”
Ok… so “zen” needs a bit more work.
Why I Write
I have ADD, which means I have the kind of brain that gets from point A to point Z by way of yellow, with a slight detour over to Rachmaninov, and bit of a dalliance at 42.
Often, by the time I get to point Z, I’ve forgotten why I was heading there in the first place.
I have a rat terrier brain. Running around in circles. Chasing this idea, then that, and then the other… suddenly all three at once.
I love the way my brain works, don’t get me wrong. The flashes of insight… unexpected connections… quick analysis… I consider a wonderful gift. There’s a lot of great stuff to be found in there — it’s just all convoluted, and oddly concatenated, and confusingly connected. I’ll be working on a concept, and then realize that it’s actually multiple concepts, but really all the same thing, but really… what I thought was related wasn’t related at all and I actually mean something completely other than what I expected. I surprise myself a lot.
Those who know me well get this about me. “I’m in a tangled mood,” makes perfect sense coming from me.
When I get “tangled,” I write. The necessity of placing ideas in a point in space on a blank page forces my thoughts into a linear format. It helps me find the order in the chaos of my mind. I rarely know what I’m trying to get across in an essay, until I have finished it. (“Oh! That’s what I meant!”) Or, sometimes, the last line is as bright and insistent to me as a neon sign — I just have to figure out how to get there.
I’m impetuous. It has always been my nature to act first, contemplate later. Writing helps me channel those energies, before I take action on a feeling that I don’t fully understand myself.
So, writing is a completely selfish act for me. I’m ok with that.
A New Direction
If you go back to the beginning of this blog, you’ll see what amounts to my Declaration of Independence. (“When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one [person] to dissolve the [marital] bands which have connected them with another…” Kind of fits, doesn’t it?)
I had no idea where my life was going, but I was sure as hell that SOMETHING was going to change. I was not going to live a half-life any longer, my soul slowly dying under the burden of obligations, and expectations, and chains that I thought I couldn’t cut.
I chose to live.
I chose to live authentically and boldly and without apology. I chose to be the kind of person I pray my children will grow up to be.
Sounds great, right?
The catch is that I had no idea what the hell I was doing, where I was going, or how I was going to get there. I had no idea how painful catharsis would be. No idea how much strength it would take: to just get up in the morning; to just keep fighting another day, when I could see no clear path to victory. I had no idea how many pieces of my old life I would lose in the process, or how, even today, the cold wind would chill my heart as it blows through those crevices.
It was worth it. Given the same situation, the same choices — but this time knowing how hard it would be, and how incredibly painful — I wouldn’t hesitate to do it all again.
I had no idea what I was doing. So I wrote. And you, my half-dozen or so faithful readers, stayed with me as I figured it out. And for your love and insight, I’ll be eternally grateful. Without that, I could not have built this new life that I am so proud to say that although it is imperfect, it is wholly mine.
And now?
I haven’t figured it all out yet. (Never will, I suspect.) However, I’ve found my center. I’ve found my strength. I’ve found my tribe.
I feel like the voice of this rarely-visited corner of the internet is changing. No longer is it interrogatory — trying to answer questions like: Who Am I?; What do I want my life to be?; How am I going to survive? Things have shifted now. I’m working in the declarative case here. This is who I am. This is what matters to me. This is what my life will look like.
Suddenly, I find myself writing my personal manifesto, a new constitution for authentic me. I hope you like what you see.
Mosaic
This is the middle of poem. I don’t know yet how it begins or ends.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Who are you to pity me for being broken –
offering to cradle me in your strong arms like something too precious and too fragile
to bear its own weight?
Why can’t you marvel at the mosaic of my many shattered selves,
Swept up, gathered and reassembled
Again and again
Into something new
The cracks and gaps filled in with a mortar made wet by my blood and tears?
The pieces were once whole, but imperfect
Now broken apart by my own hands
And by my own hands made into something new
And beautiful
I want you to relish the perfection of my flaws
And the beauty of my graceless assembly of colored fragments
Pieces of my past
Brought together in a shape meant to please me.
That about sums it up
I’m selfish, impatient and a little insecure. I make mistakes, I am out of control and at times hard to handle. But if you can’t handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don’t deserve me at my best.
— Marilyn Monroe