This Time Last Year

Last year about this time I wrote a piece called Scarred. It's interesting to go back see where I was and what I was doing a year ago. I gain some perspective of time and healing. And that is a very good thing.

I stand by all that I said in that post. Emotional scars do smooth over. I can't say I've reached the point where my past doesn't show up every day, but the impact from it is so much lower. It happened. It is fact. It is history.

The present has a way of supplanting the past. That's generally a good thing as moving forward is what I strive for. But sometimes that forward movement requires me to look back and examine how the past is impacting and informing the present.

Right now I'm going through a difficult time. Things are not right in my world, but they are not right in a way I don't feel good writing about. That is problematic for me. I use this space for processing. But here is what I can share I'm 53 years old. My children are grown and practically on their own. My husband is mid-job change, and I don't know what my next phase looks like. 

Maybe I should have planned more for this. Maybe I should have been thinking about this time, but the truth is I'm a live-in-the-moment kind of person. I've never found 5 year plans to be very helpful mostly because life (at least mine) is messy. Plan all you want but be prepared for it to go to hell in a handbasket at the drop of a hat.

I don't think that's negative. I think it's reality. So I'm looking at options. A new career path? A return to the life of a librarian? Part-time? Full-time? A major change or a minor shift? Who knows? I certainly don't.

I recently told a friend I needed God to come down and smite me on the head for clarity. I'm not usually one to wonder and fret over what God wants me to do, but I've been fretting a lot lately and I need that to change.

So if anyone has a good job idea for an undecided former stay at home mom with a masters in libary science who really only wants to work about 20 hours a week and make really good money, could you shoot me an email or just reply to this post? 

Or maybe I should just buy a lottery ticket.

linking up with Writer's Workshop

Changed

Things have changed in my world. It wasn't overnight, but they are big changes. And we're not finished. I don't know what the end result is going to look like, but going backwards is not an option.

Some of the changes were predictable. My kids have grown up. My daughter is out on her own living life as an adult, and doing quite well, thank you very much. If you'd told me just a few years ago that's where we'd be I would never have believed you.

My son is about to start is final semester in college. He's away right now on his first "adult" trip -- he planned and organized the whole thing and is driving across the country with his best friend seeing the sights and experiencing the great outdoors the way he loves. 

Those little babies I worried over have changed. They are grown-ups. Fully functional, "I can take care of myself" adults. I am so very proud of both of them. It also means I've done my job. Not that I'm no longer a mom because I'll always be that, but there's a fundamental shift in the relationship once you reach this point. I'm a touchstone for my kids. They know I'm here. They know I'll listen, talk, advise, and empathize, but they have their own lives to live now, and that's a good thing. (As long as they stay in touch regularly!)

So whether I like it or not, it's time for a change in my job description. It's unrealistic to limit myself to stay-at-home-mom at this point as I don't have any kids to be at home with anymore. I'm just not sure what I want that new job description to say. 

I've looked at some part-time opportunities and applied for a couple of full-time positions that didn't pan out. I'm not really sorry the full-time didn't happen. I don't really want a 9-to-5 job if I don't have to have one. But I'm noticing the truth in something I was told a long time ago. It's pretty hard for a 53-year-old woman to compete with all those 20-somethings searching for jobs. I'm fully qualified. I have a masters degree in my field from a good university. But I have a feeling that on paper I don't look very impressive with those longs breaks from employment. It's difficult to get credit for being a SAHM in the workplace. Most people just don't realize what good training that can be for almost any job.

I'm not complaining. I don't HAVE to get a job right now. No one is going to starve or go without anything if I don't go to work, and I have absolute faith that God will provide whatever I need. I'm just wondering out loud about this point in my life. There is a lot of change going on, which leads to a lot of uncertainty, which means I'm trusting in God more and more.

And that is a good thing.

linking up with Writer's Workshop

Word of the Day

cheap

a:  of inferior quality or worth:  tawdry, sleazy <cheap workmanship>

b:  contemptible because of lack of any fine, lofty, or redeeming qualities <feeling cheap>

A word I learned early on to hate. 

I couldn't define it, but I knew what it meant. People who were cheap were valueless. Worthless. A waste of space and time. There was no fixing "cheap". It was a degenerative character analysis to be avoided at all cost.

But here's the thing about terms like "cheap", they're relative. One man's trash is another man's treasure. And that applies to people as well as things. So while the abusers in my life saw me as cheap, tawdry, sleazy, irredeemable, even contemptible, that didn't make any of those definitions permanent or even accurate. 

For years, I've fought to discover my value as a person. Is it determined by how much money I make annually? By how productive I am in a given time period? By my weight or my car or my house or my husband or my kids or how many "good works" I do?

Is my value based on how healthy I am (another variable definition)? What I choose to do for relaxation? What I eat or drink, or don't eat or don't drink?

The recurring answer I hear when I let myself relax and listen is this, I am not cheap. I am valuable because I am a person. A being made in the image of God. I exist because God has a purpose for me. I may never know or understand that purpose, but that doesn't change the fact of its existence. 

Lately, I've been praying a series of rules or daily offices or prayers (whatever you want to call them) and this line keeps standing out to me

Fulfill now, O Lord our desires and petitions as may be best for us,

     granting us in this world the knowledge of Your truth . . . 

I have chosen to trust in God's knowledge of me. I have chosen to trust that He knows what is best for me, regardless of what I ask. I believe God has much better things to do than worry about cheap people or stuff. If His desire is to hear from me and grant me the knowledge of His truth, then there's no way I'm cheap.

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The Last 5 Books . . .

I love to read! That being said, I'm not very good at writing reviews. I get bogged down in the minutiae, and I don't want to enforce my opinions on anyone else. However, I do love to know what other people are reading, so I'm figuring there are other like-minded people out there. Here's a list with a few comments on the last 5 books I've read.

1. Tiny Little Thing by Beatriz Williams

". . . the vodka, I've found, is a reliable refrigerant . . . "

This mashup of Mad Men and the Kennedys makes for a decent summer read. It doesn't require much from the reader. The characters, while familiar, do bring some interesting twists and turns. Tiny is at times likeable, although I wouldn't want to be her best friend.

2. The Minotaur by Barbara Vine (Ruth Rendell)

"But good looks are not just a matter of fine, regular features, copious hair, large eyes, and a supple figure, all of which they had, but of how a woman holds herself, turns her head, smiles, her consciousness of her appearance, and the air of beauty she carries with her."

Ruth Rendell was one of the grand dames of psychological mystery and crime fiction. She is perhaps best known for her Inspector Wexford series, but I have always been partial to pseudonymous Barbara Vine novels. Since her death this past May, I've been reading through those. The Minotaur was a real find. Set in England, but with a Swedish heroine. In typical Vine/Rendell fashion the story twists and turns like the labyrinth slowing drawing the reader closer to the minotaur. I particularly enjoyed the Swedish take on British culture.

3. The Girl in Between  by Laekan Zea Kemp

“People don’t exist in just the light or the dark. They exist in the contrast. In the shadows where the two overlap.” 

Young adult literature and Kindle publishing are a perfect pair in some ways. I ran across this book on some random list of free Kindle books and decided to give it a try. Although somewhat formulaic, there is an interesting premise. Bryn Reyes, the Girl, suffers from a little-known ailment called Klein-Levin Syndrome which causes its sufferers to sleep for extended periods of time. Bryn's is different though as she dreams her way through each episode as if in an alternate universe. Interesting read, although are teenagers really like this nowadays? Being YA lit and part #1, be prepared for an abrupt ending!

4. The Blood Doctor by Barbara Vine

"Someone -- was it T. S. Eliot? -- said that human beings can't stand too much reality."

This one had everything I love in a psychological mystery -- good characters with depth, history, flashbacks, and a medical mystery as well! A good, solid story that grew on me as I read. 

5. From Doon With Death by Barbara Vine

The first in the Inspector Wexford series, I felt compelled to read it as a Ruth Rendell aficionado. As I suspected, I'm really more of a Barbara Vine fan. I'll probably read a few more Wexfords to give him a fair chance, but I don't even remember much about the story and didn't make any notes in my reading journal (never a good sign!). 

So there you go. The last 5 books I've read. The most interesting thing to me is how quickly I've read them. All 5 in July! I've almost finished another one this week. Of course, I've been battling asthma for 5 weeks so that makes for lots of reading time.

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I Am: a poem

I Am

I am kind and compassionate
I wonder about tolerance and offense
I hear a fairy whisper in my ear
I see a tiny fairy village, filled with fairies, gnomes, hedgehogs, and mushrooms
I want a vacation all by myself in a wonderfully indulgent hotel by the ocean
I am kind and compassionate

I pretend that I have a storybook existence
I feel the fairy folk are caring
I touch a fairy ring
I worry the about the lack of kindness in the world
I cry over the world's pain --

"There is so much pain. And I-I-I don't know how to not notice it" 
I am kind and compassionate

I understand that everyone sees from their own perspective
I say kindness matters
I dream of old houses filled with forgotten possessions
I try to be productive and disciplined
I hope for kindness to come back into fashion
I am kind and compassionate

(you can create your own poem here)

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Guilty?

"the disease of false guilt . . . the idea that what you feel must be true"

I felt guilty for most of my life. I wasn't sure what I was guilty of, but I knew I must be guilty of something because that was how I felt.

It's taken years of therapy to learn the concept of "false guilt". Feeling guilt is not evidence that I am guilty. In its healthiest form, guilt is a cognitive or an emotional experience that occurs when a person realizes that he or she has compromised his or her own standards of conduct or has violated a moral standard, and bears significant responsibility for that violation. So guilt helps us learn to accept responsibility for our mistakes -- that's a good thing. Unfortunately, false guilt leads us to take responsibility for anything that causes us to feel or assume guilt. So the abuse survivor feels guilty for what was done to her or him.

And guilt becomes a way of life. 

My kids used to say I felt responsible (guilty) for global warming. It was a joke rooted in truth. Anything, and I do mean anything, that went wrong I felt guilty about. People were using too many disposable diapers and paper towels? Clearly my fault. If I would just cut back the problem could be solved. 

My favorite TV show got cancelled? If I just hadn't missed those few episodes while I was taking care of my kids, going to church, helping someone out, or, God forbid, doing something for myself, clearly the show would have survived (and none of those actors, producers, camera operators, directors, make-up artists, etc. would still have jobs).

Man, that is a lot of guilt! No wonder I felt bogged down and driven to despair. Who wouldn't?

For survivors accepting guilt for the abuser's actions provides a false sense of safety. If it (the abuse) was my fault to begin with, clearly I can keep it from happening again. I was in control. I let it happen, so I can stop it from happening again. Magical thinking. 

If I recognize that it wasn't my fault, but rather the abuser's fault, then I've lost my safety mechanism. See? It's a warped perspective that functions as self-preservation. The problem is, it's a lie. I can't keep someone else from committing a crime. I can (as an adult) strive to create a safe environment that raises my chances of avoiding another attack, but even as an adult I can't eliminate the possibility of something bad happening.

Letting go of feeling guilty is one of the hardest shifts for most survivors. I know it has been for me. But, it's also the truest path to becoming a survivor.

linking up with Writer's Workshop

Journey

My journey took an unexpected turn recently. It wasn't the first one and it won't be the last, but this one caught me off guard. In hindsight, it wasn't as out of the blue as it seemed. Perhaps I just didn't want to see it coming.

It's difficult waking up one morning and realizing you're someone you never intended to be. Not the totality of me, but this one portion. A significant sized aspect of my personality, my life, has been wrapped up in a place I never meant to experience.

All week I've been thinking about the exchange between Shrek and Donkey. You know, the one about onions and cake and parfaits? 

People are like ogres and onions. So are relationships. Some of the layers are good and some are, well, not so good. Right now I'm riding out a tough layer, but I'm staying the course because I remember all the good layers. 

Most journeys are like onions. They have layers, and it's not until some time has passed that we can look back and see the totality and how it all fit together to form the whole. And all those cliched sayings are true -- 

Life is a journey.

It's not about the destination. It's about the journey.

Some of those layers are just harder to digest than others.

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Break

Do I "break" -- fall apart, fragment, shatter -- or do I "break" -- pause, take a rest, a respite?

Another flashback. Another reminder of pain from the past. Knee jerk reactions to deny, run and hide, beat myself up. Is this the one that takes me down? The one that smashes me permanently? The heel of his palm to my nose. Searing pain that leaves me staggering, ripe for the attack that follows.

My husband points out that it means I fought back. And he never showed up at my door again. It was the last attack. Something good from this latest reminder of pain? 

So I write about it. I cry on the massage table. I talk to my husband. My therapist. I seek help. I feel all those feelings again -- fear, guilt, paranoia, self-loathing, denial.

I pause and take a respite. A retreat with my husband for the weekend. We may talk about it or we may put it aside for the time being. More than likely it will be a bit of both. 

But I choose the second definition. Because this time I get to choose.

linking up with Five Minute Friday and Writer's Workshop

The Best Kind of Day

You can go back to your childhood for one day. What day and age do you choose?

To quote Joyce Summers, "My, that's a terrible thought."

I pick a day in mid-spring the year I was 4. It's before the awful started. Before I knew to be afraid. Before I knew bad things could happen to me.

I am at my grandparents' house. I stay with my great-grandmother while everyone else is at work. She has chores to do, but she includes me in all of them. We bake biscuits together. She lets me have my own lump of dough to roll out all by myself. I sneak little bites of the dough. We place biscuits on the little black baking sheets, and I play with my doll while Nur gets the rest of our meal ready.

Later we will wash clothes and hang them on the line to dry. We'll take a walk through the back field and go home to pull off the briars that have stuck to my socks. Maybe we'll play Old Maid. But through it all, I will hum and sing and smile and dance, because I know I am loved. I know I am safe, because nothing bad has ever happened to me.

Emily Webb in "Our Town", after she has died, asks to go back for just one day. Mrs. Gibbs says, "No!—At least, choose an unimportant day. Choose the least important day in your life. It will be important enough." Emily chooses her 12th birthday, but she can't bear it, saying, "All that was going on in life and we never noticed."

So I choose an unimportant day. A day when life was so normal. The best kind of day to remember.

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Horace

His name was Horace, and looking back now, I realize that he loved me unconditionally. He was married to my great grandmother’s sister. We just called her Auntie. They were old. They’d never had children, but had taken care of several generations of nieces and nephews. Their home was always open and welcoming. I’m sure he wasn’t perfect, but he seemed perfect to me. I never saw him angry. He was warm, loving and accepting. I could do no wrong in his eyes. 

My sister and I would go and visit them. If we stayed overnight we all slept in the big room in the attic. There were 2 double beds that faced each other from opposite walls. Auntie and my sister would sleep in the bed on the left while Uncle Horace and I would sleep on the right. I never felt as secure as when we were all tucked in for the night. Normally Auntie and Uncle Horace slept downstairs in their bedroom, but when we stayed they slept in the attic with us so we wouldn’t be scared.

Eventually they sold the house and moved to the country. Not long after that Auntie had a stroke and died. We all went to the funeral and I held onto Uncle Horace all day. When we returned to the house he marched straight back to their bedroom returning a few moments later carrying Auntie’s china doll. He carefully placed her in my arms and said, “She always said you were to have this. I gave her this doll before I went to fight in World War I.” I have treasured that doll and that memory ever since.

After that we didn’t see much of Uncle Horace. My parents apparently didn’t make the time to drive out to see him anymore which meant I couldn’t see him either. Later I heard he’d moved into a nursing home. Eventually I assumed he’d died.

A few years ago I went to visit their graves. I wanted to take a moment to let them know what they had meant to me. An oasis of love and acceptance in a childhood riddled with pain and fear. I placed flowers on their graves, and told them I loved them. That’s when I noticed Horace’s death date. He’d been alive when I married. He could have been at my wedding! I’ve worked hard to accept that I didn’t abandon him personally. I was a child and thus limited in what I could do. But I miss those opportunities I could have had with him to give and receive love and acceptance.

His is the first face I’ll look for in heaven.

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