The Storm

The storm outside seems to be a manifestation of my soul this evening. For weeks now I’ve been churning inside, emotions and anguish bubbling up to the surface unbidden, painful memories haunting my sleep and darkening my days. My hope is that this is the storm that leads to a brighter tomorrow, that the work I’ve been doing on myself has come to this: the memories and pain and loss have created this storm inside me, and it won’t end until I can face all that pain without flinching. I’m finally ready, and so it’s here. I have to stand here, in the midst of the storm, and let all the hurt pass through me and finally away to be able to move forward into the sun.

My introspection has brought up many buried feelings, and lately I have been lost in them … Searching the remembered pain for things I could have done differently. I’ve spent days chastising myself for trusting someone who couldn’t be trusted with my friendship … Let alone my family. The thunder crashes in my head and heart as I feel shame, regret, and the loss of time I can’t retrieve. I look at pictures and feel the weight of the past like a boulder on my heart. I can’t escape the recrimination; it’s mine to carry.

The lightning flashes both outside my window and inside my heart as the anger melts away to pain, and then white hot fury. How dare you take the precious gift I entrusted you with, and soil it with your sick designs?? Why couldn’t you just leave me alone?? It wasn’t for you to play God with my life, and decide to “make it better.” And how is this better, exactly? The only question is if I’m more furious with you for what you tried to do to me, under the guise of love, or me for being so stupid and believing you. I can’t seem to separate where the pain ends and the anger begins, and I’m not entirely sure they’re separate anyhow.

I want to cry into the storm until I have no more voice. I want to scream until all the pain and all the rage and all the injustice is gone. What would I be left with?

When the storm ends, and the world is washed clean, there’s a silence and a waiting. I’m not there, yet. I’m still caught inside the storm. But someday soon, the clouds will part and I’ll see the sky above.

Maybe Tonight

The sound of my bedside fan seems to mark the seconds that go by, as I lie in bed staring at the silhouettes of trees standing out against a red-tinged night sky. Seconds turn to minutes, minutes bleed into hours, and I’m no closer to sleep than when I got into bed. The only noise I can hear is the fan blades whirring, stirring the air and insulating me from the sounds of the night. It seems to be a metaphor for me, isolated from the voices of the rest of the world.

You don’t really grasp how valuable human contact and closeness is until you no longer have it. I spend most nights like this, with my soul longing for anyone to want to connect, but getting nothing but white noise whenever I try to reach out. I might get two word responses, or a polite haha, maybe even an emoji … All dismissals, done out of a sense of obligation or just habit.

I have a couple really good friends. Other than them, no one really talks to me. I don’t mean conversation for the sake of it or discussing the weather … I mean really talking, about feelings and dreams and fears and heartbreaks and joy. These are the things that matter, that connect us as humans to each other. But most nights, I lie here and wait for anyone to actually wish for that kind of connection with me. I wonder why people have forgotten me … How can they not see me anymore?

I’ve tried to spark a discussion. Most nights I end up making a fool of myself, sending random memes and one line messages, because I can’t find the words to say “Please want my company. Can’t we connect?”

With a couple of exceptions, and I cherish them dearly, people have all faded into the background of my world. Now I’m alone, shouldering an almost impossible task as a single mom, and at the end of my long days when I fall into bed exhausted, I set my alarm to do it all over again tomorrow … I just wish I wasn’t one of the forgotten.

The fan keeps turning, turning, kind of like the years of my life going by. I’m starting to wonder if it will always be this way, and why. I’ve always tried to do good for others, but at the end of the day … Maybe tonight, someone will want to talk.

Maybe tonight.

Why Did You Throw It All Away?

Have you ever had a dream that just seems to repeat over and over, persisting through every wake-up? That was me, last night. I get these repeating dreams often enough that I’ve learned there’s typically a lesson in there for me, if I can just get out of my own way enough to learn it. I haven’t quite sussed this one out yet, because I already understand the message, so I’m unsure why I need to learn it.

The dream begins with me at a mall I worked at in my late teens. Back when I worked there, I was fresh out of high school, and to support my dreams of becoming a rock star I was working in a bookstore. As an avid reader, this was a dream job. At the age of 18 I found myself assistant manager, and fast tracked to get my own store.

In the dream, I stood in the mall, and looked around to find my former life, but all I saw was the success of everyone else I knew at the time. It was akin to walking down the halls of your high school, but no one remembers you anymore. Finally, one person recognized me. They walked towards me, and asked me why I threw everything away.

I woke up then. But when I fell back asleep …

I was brought back in time to a few years after starting at the bookstore. I had gone to college, while still working full-time at the bookstore. I was dreaming of a career in journalism, while also being a rock star (of course). This part of the dream was really just looking back on things that had happened, but from a 3rd person viewpoint. It was at this point in my life that my high school boyfriend, gone 4 years, reappeared. He was persistent and drove almost two hours to see me every single day. It was overwhelming while flattering, but eventually I felt smothered and the beginnings of him controlling me. I didn’t show up at his house for a planned weekend while I tried to sort out my thoughts and plan how to break it off.

He tracked down my work – in the days before Google, and not even living in the same state – and was waiting at the end of my shift Monday. He held the largest stuffed bear I’ve ever seen and a dozen roses, and begged for me not to leave him. Having never been pursued before, and a bit taken aback by his dogged persistence in finding my work, I let him back into my life.

The person from the mall approached me in the dream right after viewing that, and asked me again why I threw it all away. I immediately woke up.

When I fell back asleep, I was viewing my life a few months after he walked back in. I had dropped out of college, because juggling my full-time job and full-time schooling and going out every single night with my boyfriend was taking its toll on me. He convinced me I didn’t need it, because besides – I had him, didn’t I? It seemed to make sense.

“Why did you throw it all away?”

After falling asleep again, I watched as he convinced me that I didn’t need that dead-end job. The job I loved more than anything had gotten in the way of our time together. He still lived almost 2 hours away and we just couldn’t be together enough. I walked out of the bookstore, quitting without notice. We went on a date and spent more money neither of us could afford, but he told me it would all be ok.

“Why did you throw it all away?”

Back to sleep, and I’ve picked up and moved to his state to be with him. Every day and every night we are never apart, except when he goes to work. He quits yet another dead-end job because they wouldn’t give us the weekend off to go away together. I got another job I didn’t really love, but it was 45 minutes away from him. Somehow (not surprisingly), we agreed that I would quit. I walked out. We went to a concert.

I know. I know. I threw it all away.

A few months later I helped him get a job in his field, a career. He did well, and I got a job working as a secretary at the same company, because his dream was for us to work together always. I’d given up my rock star dreams at this point, because I’d stopped dreaming. I occasionally would stare out windows and long for … something. Something that I seemed to have misplaced along the way.

Then I was seeing our plans for marriage and children. He told me I didn’t need to work, that I could stay home with the kids and be there full-time for them. That way I was always there with a hot meal when he got home from work. He told me not to worry, he’d always support and provide for me and the kids.

I woke up for awhile after that. It was hard to get back to sleep, mostly because I didn’t want to see what came next. More because I knew what was coming next.

Next up was me getting into my 30’s, and fighting back against his control. I didn’t like being not being allowed to leave the house without him. I spoke up about being kept a virtual prisoner by him, about having to go everywhere and do everything together. So what did he do? He  quit me without notice, walking out of my life and away from his 4 children to move on with my friend. And then I was back in that mall, and everyone I ever worked with that first year was there, surrounding me. They asked me where I’d put myself and my future when I gave it all up for someone who could walk away without a backwards glance.

I didn’t have an answer … and I walked slowly away, torn apart over my lost youth and so many years given to someone who didn’t care and never did. He only wanted someone – it didn’t matter who. I was just the one who let him control me. When I started bucking his control he found someone new to control.

The irony of all of it is that he gave me 4 children, and even though he hurt me in more ways than I can count, being their mother is the greatest accomplishment and blessing of my life. I wouldn’t trade this for rock stardom or journalism or my beloved bookstore. So, in a way, his abuse and lack of real love still gave me the greatest blessing, and he can’t take that from me. All things work together for good …

He works with her now, having quit his almost-20-year career (with no notice) to be by her side all day. They have only one car, and go everywhere together: shopping, appointments, errands, everything. I suppose there’s either a lesson here or a warning …

 

Days That Slip Away …

Do you ever have days when pulling the covers off seems too hard?

I do.

I find myself firmly inside one of those today. I’m pretty sure that I had planned to leave the house by now, but here we are at almost noon, and I’m still finding reasons to linger in my comfies, in my bedroom, planning my day – as it’s passing me by.

“Mama, when are we going to the beach?” As I mentally calculate how many hours of Vitamin D we have left from the sun, I’m already writing this day off before we’ve had lunch. The guilt of not making sure they got the proper amount of sunlight during the correct hours … oy. I’m already making excuses for staying home, staying in, not trying.

I sometimes wonder how to keep all these balls in the air without faltering: 4 kids, 2 jobs, a pregnant cat (she came that way, that’s a whole other blog), and those pesky bill things. Me time? Ha! When the kids go their dad’s I do everything I can to avoid spending time with myself … alone. Netflix binges, grocery shopping, ANYTHING but facing time with me.

And here I am, the kids are with me, and I’m waffling on leaving because I’ve missed optimum vitamin D time?

Heavy blankets or not, I’m getting these comfies off and getting OUT! Maybe we’ll go the lake instead of the ocean – it’s closer. Less time in the car means more time in the sun, right?

Maybe it’s time I take a closer look and realize that 4 beautiful human beings think I’m pretty ok to hang out with … mayhaps I should consider the possibility that my company isn’t so bad.

But I’ll think about that tomorrow.