December's Illusion

The sunshine upon my balcony is tempered by my umbrella that flutters lightly in the afternoon breeze, the birds are chirping and playing in the crabapple trees that are in front of our building, its quiet, with just the music playing from my laptop, and I am actually enjoying life at the moment; regardless of the state my life is in, it is nice to finally find some sense of peace, even if it is temporary.

In the sunny spot on the balcony I have a gallon jar full of water and black tea brewing for my first batch of sun tea of the season, and the flowers in my flower pots add some vibrant color to my little outdoor space.

The other day while on my way home from work, I had a momentary glimpse of a family working on the outside of their home, Dad was holding his little girl and they were looking in at Mom in through the window, and the little brother was in the yard, playing with the dogs and it made me wonder what my life would have been like had I have had a normal childhood. Where would I be now, how much of my life would have been different…would I still have Melissa and Stephanie, would I still have my grandbabies Kailie, Lexi, Emily & Kaiden?

I keep revisiting the issue of my past and how my past has shaped me and each time I wonder if those beginings were changed, would I be changed, would I no longer be the person I am inside, would those people I have cultivated my life with be changed, and if I would be changed, if the people who matter the most to me would no longer be those same people, would I really want to go back and change my beginnings, no matter how horrible my childhood was? Each time my answers are no.

I think that while my childhood led me down a different path than most people take, my teenage years took me to another path based on what I learned as a child, and it wasn’t until my young adult life I began to realize how hampered I was because of those paths I chose as a child, I still could change somewhat, and I could ensure that the circle my life revolved in was broken so that my own children didn’t have to repeat the same life I lived.

While there will not be enough time to do all the things I wanted to do with my life, perhaps by my children seeing my mistakes that I made, and perhaps by them knowing how much I regret, they won’t make the same mistakes as I did and won’t live to regret all the things that they didn’t do.

Its a wish every parent makes.

If we go back all those years ago, back to when I first began writing at the tender age of 16, I wrote because it was a form of release. A way to let go of all the pain of growing up, the pain of being a child bride in a grown up world.  God, that was so very many years ago.

The sad thing is about growing up as I did, that as I sit here, at the ripe age of 48, I finally realize that I have lost so much of my youth trying to figure out who I was, chasing away all those shadows left behind from my tender past that I never allowed me to be me. Even now I sometimes don’t know who I am.

I pretend a lot that I have my shit together, when the truth is, I am as lost as the next person. I am definately not where I wanted to be at this age. Living in an apartment complex, selling off half my stuff just to survive, my husband can’t find a job and we have had to hit the food shelf one too many times for my liking. But, there is a positive in all of this. Even when everything is dark and gloomy there is always a positive if you look hard enough. Its a philosophy I have carried with me all of my life.

What’s the positive? I have some very beautiful daughters, three of them as a matter of fact. I have 6 beautiful grand children, and while I don’t get to see 4 of them much, actually, I have never met 2 of them, (a long story to be told another day), I have them all in my heart. Every one of them, and that helps me to smile on days when I just can’t find anything else to smile about.

When my girls were growing up, I was growing up with them.  I made a lot of mistakes as a single parent, and feel the guilt of wishing I would have done better, wishing I would have, could have spent more time with them instead of working nights, or sleeping days, or letting them go stay with their dad for weekends or summers. Wishing I would have pushed harder for what I really wanted instead of trying to be the nice guy. It took me all these years to figure out that sometime you just have to be that bitch to get what you want, what is rightfully yours. That’s sad. It also took me all these years to realize that no matter how poorly I think I did as a Mom, what matters is that my girls think that I was the best and they have their own special memories that they hang on to. What matters is that they are strong, beautiful, healthy adults and they got that way because of me.

My greatest accomplishments in life call me Mom.

What else can you ask for?

The sun filters under my patio umbrella and warms my feet as the wind pushes whisps of hair from the up-do I hastely created this morning, tickling my face. No amount of tucking will keep them in place but its a light distraction.

I finally figured out that I quit writing because no one ever read what I wrote, or if they did, no one commented on it. I was so bothered by the fact that no matter how many other sites I visited, no matter how many links I made, or comments on their sites I made, still no one visited mine. I basically quit writing because I wasn’t as popular as this or that site.

Stupid me.

Being a popular blog, or in my case not being a popular blog took all the fun out of my writing. I spent more time searching for people to communicate through blogging then I did writing and that took all the fun out of the actual art of writing; it dried me up.  I finally just decided that I don’t really care that anyone doesn’t read what I write, what matters is if it helps me – I can make peace with that.

I can deal with little or no exposure because what I really want to get out of writing is a sense of peace, a sense of personal purpose. Writing soothes my soul and while what I have to say may not be what others find interesting, writing is a form of creative expression. An empty page in front of me, or a brand new journal, is to me intoxicating. It is to me like a blank canvas is to a painter, a splash of color here and there is like a word written here and there, a shape is like a paragraph, and eventually at some point the canvas or blank page takes on a life of its own. When it is complete, I sit back and look with contentment at the life I created by giving life to something that was otherwise vacant and empty.

That is the soul of writing.

Yesterday late afternoon, while I was getting ready to get into my car to leave work, I heard Spring Peepers peeping from a small pond. This morning I woke to the sounds of birds chirping outside my window. If I look at the horizon around me, tints of green show in the tree lines. Here and there dainty white narcissus flowers have sprouted.

The glorious sights and sounds of spring.

Of course, I don’t need the sights and sounds to tell me that Mother Earth is in her journey of waking up from her long winters nap…my allergies are also in full bloom as well. But this year, even my allergies can’t stop me from enjoying one of my favorite seasons of the year.

Just before Easter, Tom, Steph, Lexi and I visited one of our favorite spots – Como Park. The flowers were in beautiful form and we enjoyed our visit as we normally do. I took a few pictures, shown are some of my favorite ones.

I am so ready for spring. Tired of feeling tired all the time. I am hopeful for positive things this year and ready to just revel in the wonder that is life.

For a few years, I have been unable to communicate. All the emotions have been trapped inside, at first packed like sardines, then the words kept piling up, laying one on top of another until soon all the air pockets were crushed and the light from even the smallest of space was blocked out and I find myself enveloped in darkness. Again.

I can still breathe, but shallowly. Most of the time I try not to focus on my breathing because when I do it feels almost as if I can’t get enough air. my chest grows tight and I feel uncomfortable, like I can’t inhale enough oxygen, and the harder I try, the less I can breathe, until finally; a deep breath gets in and I can relax for a while. Occasionally my breathing stops and the struggle will start all over again. I wonder in my head if these are anxiety, stress related incidents.

I’m so tired of the struggle.

I drag myself up in the morning, wishing hope against hope that I could just go back to bed, for just a little while longer. I try, I lie back down, knowing the alarm has been shut off my mind screams at me until I get up for fear I will fall back asleep.

I drag myself around all day, willing my mind to stay focused on my work. Begging my mind to stay alert and clear so that no one will guess just how bad this depression really is. I can’t afford to not work. I can’t afford to lose my job.

I try to think of things that I would like to do when I get home, things I would like to accomplish, but it all fails me when I walk in the door to my apartment, the cloak of darkness returns and I am weighted down with the heftiness of its emotion. My breaths coming in shallow gasps, I flop down in the recliner, where I am almost instantly drained of all energy and I beg for forgiveness and ask if he can get dinner one more time, if he could take Maggie out, just tonight. I’ll do it tomorrow, I promise!

The words got so overpowering in my head that I was so tense and taught, my jaws would not relax and the noise in my head was so extreme that I felt like screaming “QUIET!”, inside my head I think I did say it.

I am so tired of having to always be the strong one. I am so tired of being the one to keep it together. I am tired of doing all the work and finding no enjoyment for all my work because I am too busy worrying over the next battle that is looming on the horizon. There is one battle after another. I come out victorious on one, just in time to battle the next incident.

The noise in my head is quieter now, so quiet I can hear the bathtub faucet dripping from the bedroom. I’ll have to go fix that before that is all I hear, drip-drip…drip-drip…drip-drip-drip. The bedroom window is open a crack and even though there is snow on the ground and the temperature is still freezing, the cool, crisp air is refreshing to the stale, hot odors of the entire apartment complex. Someone had bar-b-que for dinner, someone else had onions with their dinner, and someone else had pizza. (I saw the delivery guy pull up).

I’m exhausted once again, but it is a good kind of tired. The kind of tired that permeates your whole body, oozing out of your pores, the kind of tired that lets you know that you have truly accomplished something for once.