If you want to get right in your head, at peace with your soul, talk to a seven-year-old. I spent the last week chewing on journals from my past, while at work I talked with my students about their future. We've been reading articles about people who made great contributions to the world. One person we read about, then watched a video on, was Mae Jemison. She was the first African-American in space, but that's not what the children and I thought was so special about her. What we dug the most was the fact that on her eight day trip to space, she took items with her to represent "people who aren't always included." She thought it was important! So did we. The children and I swapped stories about times when we felt left out and came to the conclusion that nobody should ever have to feel that way. We also thought that everyone should have a chance to make whatever dreams they wish come true. We also liked that as a child, she was obsessed with going into space and she did everything she could to see that dream through.

At the end of that lesson, I asked all of the children, "If you were going to send a letter to yourself thirty years into the future, what would you tell grown-up you?" Most told me they'd remind their older self to be kind to others (...which made me wonder if they felt like once you grow up, you somehow outgrow kindness). My favorite answer, however, was, "I'd tell myself to never give up on your dreams." One young lady looked at me very seriously and said, "Just don't quit, no matter how hard it is. Don't quit." I replied, "I hope on that thirty-year-day, you'll remember exactly what you told me." She hugged me tight and I sent her back to class. Funny that I am now the age their "30-year-old" selves would be when that letter arrived. They may forget this activity with me and the letters they'd sent to themselves, but I'm going to tuck all of those letters inside my heart and take them with me every step of the way into my future. I can't think of anyone else giving me more expert advice!

Fried eggs & Manipulation: 2 November 2013
 
 
Any connoisseur of a good fried egg knows that when making them, you have to be gentle and extremely patient. If you crack the egg open too rough, you break the yolk by the time it touches the pan. If you have the pan too hot, you get the egg too brown and the taste is not as exquisite. And when you turn them with the spatula, you have to ohhh so gently slip them from one side to the next. Cook them too long, the yolk becomes overdone and hard. Cook them too little, even the whites remain runny and unpalatable. You must go slow, sliding them into the pan on just a tiny pat of butter to keep them slick and flavorful. And from start to finish, patiently watching.
 
People who are good at manipulation do exactly the same thing, smoothly, quietly coaxing others into doing whatever it is they want them to do. I mean, we are all guilty of manipulating others for our own benefits at one time or another. For example, babies will cry and if someone comes to pick them up almost immediately, they make that first manipulating connection: Cry = Food/Love/Attention. Or the wife who says to her husband, "Honey, I'm cold," and he gives her his coat/turns up the heat/brings a blanket to put on the bed. Even the stripper, who blatantly flaunts his or her body for money and usually their dances/performances/etc. have absolutely zero to do with their own sexual arousal, while they expertly manipulate the sexual desires of others for money. I've had one or three stripper friends in my life; talking with them about it is extremely interesting. My former step-monster was a master manipulator and when I was a child, she would have gotten much better results in her attempts to manipulate me if I hadn't been living with my grandmother, who wrote the proverbial book on manipulation. In order to even survive at the house where I grew up, I had to learn skills to help gauge when I was being manipulated and strategies to avoid them, an education skill set that began when I was four. By the time my step-monster started trying to do it, I'd already become quite adept at evasive maneuvering, as well as recognizing when it was happening...to the point where it was as familiar to me as my "A, B, C's". I find myself still good at those evasive tactics unless I am vulnerable and not on my "A" game. If there is too much going on emotionally in my head/heart/life, recognizing the subtle cues used by master manipulators is difficult, even for someone who knows what to look for. 

I wish I could say I don't understand the purpose of manipulating someone, but it's simple enough to figure out...people do it to get what they want, the way they want it, and the fact that it may come at another's expense doesn't seem to matter. To my mind it is a cheap shot and a lazy option. That being said, I confess to my own tactics. I am an expert level "button pusher" which is its own form of manipulation. Most of the time, I use my button-pushing skills to force a response other than indifference, an action I utterly despise. I have, however, been known to push buttons just to see what will happen (I've done this many times in college classes I've taken in order to kick-start a conversation or debate). Getting people spun up for my own entertainment is not a desirable character trait. I would say I'm working on it, but that would be a lie. Seeing people passionate or angry actually tells you a lot about who they are down deep. People who go on a personal attack are usually insecure and/or have a flimsy argument they don't know how to defend. People who logically argue their point without tearing down others and are willing to listen to opposing views even if it doesn't change their minds...those are the people in a room I want to be sitting near, standing with at the end of the day. Does this make me a bad person? I don't think so. I want to know what people are made of before I decide to align myself with them in any way. I want to know their moral character. The quickest, most effective way to do that is to make someone angry. That flash-point is where their soul shines the brightest and shows how they truly treat others. Some have called me obnoxious for my button-pushing ways. I can live with that.

From my old journal:

1 November 2013
 
Funny how I dream of sharks, but wake and think of dragons. I used to believe I needed to slay my dragons (those dark, scary things that lurk inside of us and threaten to rip us apart from the inside, out) but I've changed my mind. I can see in my mind "little Me" standing in front of all these big, monstrous dragons and petting their big, fiery noses, kissing their leathery, bumpy skin and coaxing them to come play with me, to teach me how to fly!
 
When my mother died, a friend of mine sent me a book called "Conversations With God" and I was amazed, by the time I got around to reading it, just how many of the messages in Book 1 resonated with me. Thinking of my dragons reminded me of a passage in book one that I'd highlighted long ago. I smile as I pull the book (a little dusty now, The Fairy Godmother is fired) and open up to the exact place I was thinking of...and place God's message to me here with my dragons:
 
 
 
 
"--every single free choice you ever undertake arises out of one of the only two possible thoughts there are: a thought of love or a thought of fear. Fear is the energy which contracts, closes down, draws in, runs, hides, hoards, harms. Love is the energy which expands, opens up, sends out, stays, reveals, shares, heals. Fear wraps our body in clothing, love allows us to stand naked. Fear clings to and clutches all that we have,  love gives all that we have away. Fear holds close, love holds dear. Fear grasps, love lets go. Fear rankles, love soothes. Fear attacks, love amends. Every human thought, word, or deed is based in  one emotion or the other. You have no choice about this because there is nothing else from which to choose. But you have free choice about which of these to select...Yet I teach you this: when you choose the action love sponsors, then will you do more than survive, then will you do more than win, then will you do more than succeed. Then will you experience the full glory of Who You Really Are, and who  you can be." (Conversations With God, book 1 by Neale Donald Walsch...pp.18-19)-------my copy is hilarious...highlighted, written all inside (questions and comments as I read) and with little post-its sticking out all over the place.
 
Come play with me, my Dragons...

From my old journal:

Old barns, Front Porches, & Lightning 31 October 2013
 
It is not always easy to reach for and pluck a happy memory from my childhood, but the fondest ones come from exploring the thick woods behind our house, playing in the old red barn we had, and hanging out on the front porch. There was a lazy little creek deep in the woods filled with frogs, crawdads, water spiders and other living things I didn't have the names for but was still fascinated with watching as they skimmed their dance across its surface.We had all kinds of critters living around...deer, bunnies, squirrels, foxes and my favorite, a family of skunks that lived in the barn. Aunt Mattie would take table scraps and put them down by the barn in a compost heap that helped nourish our huge garden and often a lot of the critters, including our cute mama skunk with her babies, would visit to feast on our leftovers. I'd climb up onto the kitchen chair  and stand, looking out the window in eager anticipation of whatever animals I'd be able to catch a glimpse of. I was always secretly hoping, however, to see that mama skunk and her babies. One day, while Aunt Mattie was cooking at the stove next to me, I was waiting for feeding time to commence when a huge bolt of lightning came out of nowhere and struck the apple tree right by the barn. It blew off the entire side of part of the tree. I jumped down from the chair, and like a shot, raced to Aunt Mattie's bedroom hiding under the bed for over an hour. A couple of summers later, while playing with Barbie's out on the front porch, lightning struck the house and went down the grounding wire right next to where I'd been playing. The ground "exploded", dirt flying everywhere. These two traumatic events (well, traumatic for a little girl not yet six) created a terror for thunderstorms that stuck with me until I was grown and had babies of my own. Before the girls were born, whenever I could hear a storm brewing off in the distance, I'd come close to hyperventilating from the fear bubbling inside of me. When my girls came along, I didn't want to transfer my fear of storms to them, so I shoved it down into the deepest place in me, a horrible habit that has dogged my footsteps my entire life. During storms I'd force myself to remain calm, telling the girls how beautiful Mother Nature was and that there was nothing to be scared of. I said those things to them over and over again so many times that finally there came a day when I did, in fact, find them beautiful.
 
The best feature of the house I grew up in was always the large front porch. It was stereotypically the gathering place on a lazy, hot day with a cool glass of water and the hope of a stray breeze, or at evening time, snapping beans, watching the lighting bugs dance through the maples and pines. My cousins and I spent many hours playing there, and I always gravitated to it when I needed some serious "thinking time". Every now and then when I drive by that house now, just seeing it brings Mattie to mind. It is a spot my mind associates with her perhaps more than any other. She and I had many talks sitting there on that porch. She'd snap beans or shell peas by the bushel, her apron dirty with leaves and debris from the garden, while I peppered her with a million questions. I know I fired them at her like wild bullets in an old spaghetti western gunfight, but she patiently picked through each one, answering them as best she could. "Why can't we see God? Are angels real? When babies die, do they automatically go to Heaven? Why does God let bad things happen? Does my Daddy love me? Why doesn't he want to spend time with me? Why is Mommy jealous of me? Did I do something to hurt her or make her angry? Why did they leave me?" On and on it went, her answers gentle and kind, even though I know many things I asked made her angry. I believed her answers without question, her word the only I trusted as the "truth". I'd ask her, "But how do you know (insert whatever we happened to be talking about)?" She'd smile and say, "Because it feels right to my heart. It fits." Once I became a mother, I started to question not just her words and philosophies, but others around me as I worked on what my own "truth" was supposed to look like, feel like, what felt right in MY heart. She'd like that I did come around to thinking for myself. I'm sure taking her word as law was a lot of pressure!  I can't image what it must have been like for her trying to make sense of a world that made no sense at all to a small girl that wasn't her daughter, but she happily treated as such. And the one thing that sticks out in my mind the most about her is, when questioned about why I lived with her instead of my parents, which was always my most frequent question, her answer remained as simple as, "...because I wanted you." That was a good enough reason for her. I am eternally grateful she felt that way.
 

...a continuation of prior hand-written journals I wrote before I began my writing career:

Later that Day: The Dark and the Light 28 October 2013
 
I thought I was done with what was swirling in my mind for the day, but I forgot the number one rule of journaling...you're not done until you're DONE and sometimes that means a pregnant pause before another thought grabs hold of you and won't let go. As I processed my thoughts about Aunt Mattie for the day, Grandma kept cropping up.
 
 Aunt Mattie was the oldest of nine children. My grandmother was the middle child, but the personality gap in between the kind of people they were was light years apart. For all of Aunt Mattie's light, love, patience, kindness and understanding, grandma countered with darkness, bitter hate, venom, and a general disconnectedness with humanity.  I remember as an adult being in one of my Sociology classes and upon hearing the traits and characteristics of a sociopath thinking how many of them suited my grandmother (i.e. superficial charm and good intelligence, unreliability, untruthfulness and insecurity, lack of remorse and shame, pathologic egocentricity and an incapacity for love). She was, in fact, part of the reason why I nearly got a degree in Sociology, as I just couldn't get enough of unraveling behaviors I'd often been the target of, all the while thinking it was because something was wrong with me, when in truth I wasn't the one with the issues at all. I once asked Aunt Mattie what made her so hateful and Mattie said, "Honey, she was born that way." From that point until many years later, I had an irrational fear that the black taint, that poison of her genetics was somehow passed on to me and would show up at some unknown future point. Frequently when I became hurt or angry, I could hear words she would have screamed forming in my mind, telling me to fight back her way. I would not, however, allow emotions to turn me into some vile creature and couldn't have found it in myself to justify causing harm to another in an attempt to salve my own anger. That end never justified the means, even to my small child mind. Still, the words WERE there. For my own self-preservation, I learned at an early age how to spot weaknesses in myself and others in case I might need to use them in the future to save myself. It is a horrifying skill set to have.
 
 I was so repulsed by the things that would come out of the mouths of adults around me (not just from my grandmother), that I developed this "do the loving thing in all things" mindset and applied it to almost everything as a counterbalance to a sludge that seemed to coat everything around me until I felt suffocated. The truth is, though, no matter what you tell yourself, sooner or later you're going to be angry at those who cause you harm... seriously, irrationally, your head's about to explode angry. In those moments, there is a war inside of me. I want to do the loving thing, but I also want to do the damaging thing to save myself from the pain someone has caused me. I want to hurt them more than the pain I'm feeling in a lashing out kind of reflex. I suppose to some degree that is true of everyone, but I have had to learn rigid, tight control of myself at those times because deep down somewhere, grandma's programming is there and it knows how to cause utter destruction. I am fortunate to have realized sooner than most, perhaps, that in doing that, lashing out in that way, we cause much more harm to ourselves. Hateful actions are poison, toxins difficult to cleanse once they've been released. That price is too much to pay, as if you allow it to, it will eat away your soul. It certainly ate hers. When she died, to my mind she was a shell devoid of even the smallest hint of joy, and I could not think of a single, truthful or kind word she'd ever said to anyone.
 
 The dark and the light live inside of me, inside us all. To deny one is to deny the other and leave "nothingness" in its wake. The test...the trick...the challenge is, which will we allow to influence our choices. Which will we allow to hold the control over who we are? I came to this realization for myself long before J.K. Rowling layered that theme through out her beloved books. Perhaps that pervasive theme in Harry Potter's life is big part of what endeared them to me for the rest of my life.
 

 From my old journal: Day Two Entry

Aunt Mattie 28 October 2013
 
One day when I was out shopping in the pixel world, I came across this compass necklace. It didn't occur to me at the time why I wanted it so much, but later, I realized that the compass, for me, represents Aunt Mattie. Inside of me, she is "directional North" and has been since my very earliest memories. When I was four, she flew to New Orleans where my mother and I were living to collect me and bring me back to North Carolina. The reasons why she came are unclear, but I know there was "hushed" talk about the babysitter I was staying with abusing me. I have no memories of that except sometimes in dreams where it feels as if she locked me in a closet over night while my mother was out on a date. There was also mention of my mother wanting to enjoy being single, dating, etc., and a little girl getting in the way, although that was never said to my face. It was so long ago, I don't know what to believe and there's no one left to ask, although really the details don't matter now. I only remember that when we got to her home (which later became my very first "Safe Harbour" even though it was never completely safe for me, it was certainly safer than where I'd come from). I was very skittish around people and had nightmares. So, I slept with her and I vividly remember that to help me fall asleep she'd pat my little butt and hum songs to me. If she fell asleep before me, I'd rock into her and say, "Pat me. Pat me." She'd wake up and keep going until I finally fell asleep even though frequently she'd have to get up early the next day and go to work. When I moved in, her husband moved to the bedroom next door and it wasn't until I was grown that I fully understood the implications of how much having me there uprooted her own life. She did, in fact, retire early so she could stay home and take care of me full time. I asked her once, "Why did you come get me? Why didn't daddy or grandma come for me?" and she said, "I didn't come because no one else would do it and I had to. I know you've been told that, but it's not true. I came because I wanted you. I wanted to protect you and keep you safe. I wanted you to have a  home. You are my last chickie and as long as I'm alive, you will have a home here." When she died in 2003, it felt as if my "home" had just been eradicated off the face of the earth.
 
I wish I could remember the stories she told me over the years growing up, or better yet, written them down. Everything about her became the template to which I "built" myself, from her unwavering Faith to her gentle southern grace, I wanted to be as kind, forgiving, and loving as she was. I never quite measured up to some of those standards and adjusted others to better suit my own personality, but I know she wouldn't have been disappointed in me for my "failings". She was always champion to the imperfect, the underdogs, and angelic friend to the world's villains. She gave up her own dreams of being a writer and traveling the world, to help raise her brothers and sisters, and later their children, and finally, me. She felt this was her duty but that didn't make her bitter about it. She did so with love, grace, and a whole boatload of patience, which I'm sure all of us tried mightily before it was all done. She told me a story of when I was not yet three, before I moved with my mother to New Orleans, about keeping me for the weekend and bringing me to church. She said I was playing with the things in her purse and found her lipstick. She hadn't been paying attention to me until Dr. Martin (the preacher) looked in her direction and grinned. She looked to see what he was smiling about and saw me with red lipstick all over my mouth, cheeks and chin and just shook her head. I don't remember her ever scolding me, but she was "very disappointed in me" the day I lied to her and skipped school and she found my butt before even 9 o'clock. Her disappoint in me made me want to die. 
 
I didn't have "rules" in the house where I grew up. Aunt Mattie would just say, "I trust you to do what is right." And even though she was my hero, as a mother I disagree with her lax parenting philosophies. Letting me make up my own rules was a very dangerous thing and usually got me in way over my head. I WANTED to do the right thing, but I wasn't always sure what that was until it was too late and I'd be like, "Well THAT wasn't it!" Most of my mishaps I diligently kept from her. She also tried very hard to shield me from the abuse that was a constant shadow over my world, but to no avail. I resigned myself at a young age to just survive it until I was old enough to escape it on my own, and I did. I also swore that viscous cycle would end with me. That, too, was a battle I won. My girls knew absolutely nothing about any of that until they were nearly grown women in their own right.
 
I know Aunt Mattie has been on my mind a lot lately because I'm once again searching desperately for the "right path" in my life. It's extremely frustrating to get to this age/phase/stage when I thought I'd be "settled" onto a certain path with the way before me relatively clear, only to find myself utterly lost and standing at this Crossroads. It makes me want to scream and throw a toddler-worthy tantrum of epic proportions, even though I know that is completely pointless. Apparently this state of confusion I'm experiencing is called my "midlife crisis". That term both aggravates and comforts me. It annoys me because it makes me feel as if I've become trapped in some stupid cliche'. It comforts me because at least I know it's relatively common and normal. What I'd rather know is that there is an end in sight, because right now it doesn't feel as if it will ever make sense, it doesn't feel as if anything will make sense except that I've outlived my usefulness, done all I've come here to do and have now reached the age where I wait to die. I have run out of places to look for answers and patience to just "wait it out". This is not a good thing, because when I feel this way is when I'm in my most self-destructive mode. It leaves me wondering every single day if this is the day I destroy my entire life just to see what will happen next. It's not a good feeling!

I was going through some of my old journals yesterday and found a group of entries so raw I'm surprised my fingers weren't singed black just from touching them. They were really difficult to read, but once I was done I was amazed at the peace I felt deep inside. This tells me that those parts of me that used to bleed from those experiences truly have healed over (finally)!!! I will be sharing them with you over the next few days in the hope that you may find something of use to take away.

Here is the first...

Marriage: Journal for 27 October 2013
 
My thoughts on this topic have changed dramatically from how I felt about it as an eighteen-year-old bride to what I think about it now, twenty-six years later. Up until the night before my wedding, I believed many of the stereotypical notions...like, finding that "one" person you're "supposed" to spend the rest of your life with, sharing everything, being this joined "team" against the world, and a plethora of ideas I'd grown up on. Lots of guys still flirted with me when I was engaged, some of whom at one time or another, I dated and still cared for. But none of that mattered. All I saw was Brad. I put him up on this pedestal, as if he were my modern day Knight in Shining Armor who would rescue me from the damage and pain of my childhood and help me create a life that was "right" in the face of all that "wrong. It had been all I could dream of since I was little, and I now realize just how much pressure that must have been for him. Our dating and engagement seemed so perfect, in line with the fantasy in my mind of how it would be. Then, on the night before our wedding, he had a bachelor party that shattered my illusions. I got a phone call saying I should "come right away" and adamantly insisted my cousin, who was spending the night with me, take me to the party. She objected, but did so anyway, knowing how determined I was to go. When I arrived, Brad was wearing nothing but his underwear and he was being carried over the shoulder of his friend, Mike, back into the building (I learned later this was because they'd thrown him into the pool). To say it didn't look good is an understatement. By the time I got through his groomsmen and inside, he was lying on his back on a sofa, so drunk I'm not even sure he knew my name. It became quickly clear that asking him about the evening was a waste of time. So, I left, trying mightily to make sense of what did and didn't happen. I didn't sleep much that night, pondering what I would do when the new day dawned. Prior to that night,  I would have never believed he'd do something to jeopardize our future, and now it appeared as if that was the case. What if I'd been wrong about him? Wrong about us? What if we were making a mistake? The doubts piled one on top of another, even though I was still clueless as to what, in fact, had taken place. But assuming the worst was something I was really good at back then, mostly because I'd learned as a child the hard lesson that sooner or later it did, in fact, come...the "worst" part. I married him in the church that next day, but the doubt had taken root. Months later, when I finally got to see the videotape of the bachelor party (which was actually pretty tame), the pervasive word that comes to mind, played through my mind over and over is "betrayed". Did I over-react? You bet. But you know what they say about hindsight?!
 
That theme played out over and over again in those first years, largely due to the fact that we were so young and NOT ready to get married in the first place. I kept telling myself it would get better, and for a little while it would. Then, something would happen and we'd be right back in this pit of mistrust and betrayal. By the time we'd both grown up enough for it to actually get better and stay that way, we'd done so much damage it was impossible to see past it. Aunt Mattie used to say, "Take care of what you say to people, what you do to them...because they may forgive you, but you can't take any of that back once it's out there and when you cross that line, whatever that line is for you, there is no going back." It was years later before I fully understood this, and it doesn't just apply to your spouse. It is true for every relationship we have in our lives. I remember when my grandmother crossed my own proverbial line, and boy did I let her PUSH at it for a really long time. But when my mother died and she said to my face, "I forgive your mother for all the bad things she said and did to me when she was alive", a switch flipped inside me that was never going to go back. After all the ways in which she'd damaged my mother from a baby to the day she died, never once even telling her she loved her and SHE forgave my mother? All I could think of was my own youngest child, so much like what I imagined my "little mom" to be like, and how I'd have lost my shit if anyone treated her the way my mother had been treated. I was polite to my grandmother after that, but I dug her out of anything and everything in my life from that point, on.
 
Five years into my marriage, I'd come to the conclusion that my marriage wasn't shaping up at all to any visions I'd previously had about what it was supposed to be. I was supposed to feel safe. I was supposed to feel loved. Instead, I felt betrayed. Society has given us so many myths about what marriage is that for awhile, I was furious at the world, in general. Where was my "happily ever after"? Where was that "practically perfect male compliment" to me? I shared all of who I was then with him and repeatedly had it spit back into my face. "Share your fantasies with me"...only to have them used against me. "Share your hopes with me"....only to have those ignored, while he did what he wanted to do, the way he wanted to do it, and consequences be damned. "Share your truth with me" while he hid things from me or lied about our finances over and over. "Give  yourself to me"...and when I did, have him treat me for YEARS with indifference unless he wanted something. So, I learned how to build walls and close off more and more of me, locking some of myself inside a cage of my own building for fear that those deepest parts of me would be used against me. I was right back in the middle of my childhood nightmare, only this time I'd put myself there all on my own through the choices I'd made. Nobody put any of THAT into the "fine print of my marriage license", although now I'm old enough to understand that we were both just children playing house and we were really BAD at it! And so it went...on and on, year after year stuck in this loop until I had my girls and wanted out.

When we came back from England, I told my mother (and she was the only one I told) that I was going to finish my degree and divorce him. It was the most difficult decision of my life because at that point I felt like such a failure and now all those people who'd flat out told me to my face that I would BE a failure would be right. I felt crushed, defeated and so damn lost. She told me she'd stand by me, whatever I wanted to do, and help me when she could. She added, though, that she thought I was making a mistake. She said she thought Brad was "right" for me and would come around, grow into the man I needed him to me. I didn't believe her. And then suddenly, she was dead. I don't even remember how long I knelt on the floor of our townhouse in base housing screaming when I got the call. I don't even know what happened the next several days, as I walked around like a zombie. During the funeral, I vividly remember Sarah, my youngest daughter, who was four at the time, standing on the pew next to me, putting her tiny hands on both sides of my face, turning me to look at her. She said, "It's okay to cry, Mommy. Crying doesn't make you weak. It makes you strong." Before THAT moment I always felt like I was so weak if I cried, probably because my grandmother  taught me to never, ever show my pain or it would be used against me. By nature, I am very expressive, so I learned how to shove deep, hot emotions down into dark spaces to protect myself. And here was this tiny girl of mine, opening up the floodgates of years of emotions that poured out until I was nearly blind from them all, over-whelmed from them! And like it or not, they were never going back into that box again. That scared the hell out of me!

Days after her funeral, Brad and I went to my mother's house for the first time to start packing up her things. Her jacket was hanging on a chair by the door...her shoes underneath. I put both on, sniffing her jacket to smell her scent. I turned my head and there was her blood, feet from where I stood, staining the carpet. I FREAKED out, sobbing so hard I thought I'd throw up, shaking uncontrollably. Brad tenderly guided me back into her bedroom to work on the things in her closet and told me not to come out of the room. When I finally ventured out a long time later, he was on the floor, on his knees, trying desperately to scrub her blood out so it wouldn't upset me. It was the first time in a long time that I looked at him with love in my eyes instead of betrayal. After her affairs were finally settled, I let him take me away from North Carolina to grieve and heal. I told him about my plans for a divorce but agreed to stay with him until I could get on my own two feet.  In Arizona he tried so hard to get me to let him in again, to get me to invest in "us" again, but to my mind too much damage had been done.  I had long since stopped feeling safe and gotten comfortable wearing the "mask" that society wanted me to wear, so I wore it, getting through each day, throwing myself into my girls, my education, and a new career I found in the midst of all those broken pieces.
 
When I finally came out of that fog of grief, I knew I wasn't going to live my life another day feeling afraid, lost, empty or unlovable. My husband got orders to Korea and asked me to wait until he got back and we'd figure it out together. I agreed. I gave him my wedding band and he put it on a chain he wore around his neck the entire time he was in Korea. Meanwhile, I met a friend online who'd been married as long as my husband and I, and we began to talk. Prior to discussing relationship issues with him, I didn't really have any married male role models I trusted or knew well enough to ask honest, raw questions about what it meant, how people made it work, etc. Every day for a year he and I had conversations about all of this, at the same time, Brad and I were having the most honest conversations of our entire relationship. At that point there was nothing left to lose by laying all the "cards on the table".   I also started reading about what others had to say in regards to marriage and what they believed it to be. Who made it work? How did they make it work? How did they make it last? I also prayed, a lot! 
 
I didn't know how much of me I was holding back from MYSELF after years of conditioning had taught me if you show who you really are to people, sooner or later they'll just use that to hurt you. And if you show them who you are too deeply, you give them the power to destroy you completely. Older me, however, understands that people are messy and don't always live up to your expectations. That is true for ourselves, as well. I am such a "Type A" personality and when I was  younger, when I'd make ANY mistake, I would beat myself up about it for a long time. Perfection is something I will never attain and I have made peace with that. Making my own mistakes, letting myself down, has taught me how to find forgiveness in others AND for myself. Learning how to love with an open heart, and still keep enough of myself not to completely lose myself in them is something else I've learned how to do. I am happy that I can continue to love, even when it scares me because even if it hurts, I have stayed true to who I am and I have continued to LIVE. To take chances. To plant seeds of that love, that light in others.
 
Marriage, to me, is a leap of faith we take with another person day after day after day. It is a choice we make, day after day after day. And frankly, I believe that society has defined marriage by parameters that are bullshit. Fighting about gay marriage? Who are "they" to tell others whom to love? The Bible defines marriage as "one man and one woman" but why can't their be other definitions? Why is that the final word? Other cultures have marriages that involve multiple spouses, usually wives. But why is that acceptable and not the other way around? Why does love have to be placed on a slide like some litmus test and examined to see if it "fits" into the proverbial box of social norms? For some people, marriage is the trappings of what society's expectations are...but if that is true of everyone, why is divorce such a common occurrence? I have a dear friend who is like a sister to me, and she says she thinks marriage should be a "five year renewable contract where if it doesn't work out you just don't sign up again with that person...no harm, no foul." I'm not sure I buy THAT but I think that it is certainly open for interpretation. After a host of skips and starts, mistakes, anger, disappointments, failures and finally forgiveness, Brad and I agreed to keep choosing each other day after day, one day at a time...and sometimes hour by hour. In the end, my mother was right. Brad grew up, I grew up...I mean it was bound to happen, right? And somehow in the muck, mud and messes we've gone through, we found we had, in fact turned into the "right" people for each other. God, my mother is beside herself with glee somewhere in the great beyond to hear me say, "Hey mom, you were right" (and about more than just that, too). Perhaps his mom and mine are having a great laugh about it right now!

The amount of money we spend each year on cable services, internet connections and cellphone services is staggering considering the quality of those products. It seems as if the more technologically advanced we become, the lower the standards are on the products or services we purchase. And frequently when something goes wrong we are forced to talk to an automated system (or swear at one, as was the case for me this morning). I could be assuaged, less likely to lose my cool if this were an isolated incident, but it is becoming ever more frequent, and not just for me.

Case in point: Last night before bed, my Direct TV stopped working, the TV showing a "loss of signal" message. This morning it was still off, so I called the customer service number. They are supposed to have 24/7 tech support, and they do, but what they fail to tell you is that you cannot speak to a LIVE person except during "such and such" hours. If you have a problem that is not during those hours, you can go to the website or listen to an automated set of instructions in order to troubleshoot whatever's wrong (that are, by the way, not helpful)!

When I moved into this house and got Direct TV installed in October of 2012, I was assured that since my house had a clear view of the sky, our satellite should have no problems. That, alone, should have set off all kinds of warning bells! Since that initial activation date, I have had nothing but problems and they're getting worse, while my bill continues to go up. I thought, "Maybe it's just me" until I got on their website after being unable to get a live person on the phone and there they were, hundreds of complaints just like mine (every single one of these problems below I've had at least twice since 2012)!

L.G. says, "Our service has been terrible for weeks and it is very frustrating. We have pixelated signals continuously and I have called several times with poor results. It needs to be fixed before the Bronco game at two. Can’t wait to cancel next summer!!!" (...for this, they changed out all of my cable boxes THREE separate times)

K. adds, "Cannot believe we gave up TWC for this awful service. We set up a series to record and when the day comes it shows that it’s not recording. Then sometimes it will show that a show is recording and you’ll go to the list and nothing’s on there. Worst cable service I have ever had." (...for this, I can count on an event like this at least once every couple of months)

D.A. expresses, "Worst TV reception since rabbit ears. Takes forever to start up, goes into freeze mode in great weather. I have missed the end of 3 movies in the last 10 days after watching for 1 1/2 hours, froze in the last 5 minutes of show. Package has more repeat and garbage channels than anything else." (...this is also a common occurrence with my service)

On and on they go, and the more I read them, the more I want to take my laptop and fling it off the deck in frustration! How do they stay in business? Because the alternatives are just as problematic (I know, I've changed my services through a proverbial spin-the-wheel carrier option)! And in almost all of these services, there is nearly no customer support, or when you have it, there is little to nothing they can actually do to fix many of the problems that arise (I've been told this so often, I can almost predict when that little ditty is going to come out of the rep's mouth). And do they offer you a refund for time and money you've wasted with them? In going on more than two decades of dealing with these things, I have yet to have one.

Remember "back in the day", when making a decent product or providing stellar service meant something? Companies like that are becoming few and far between. I do not consider the demise of quality work/services to be progress in any way, shape, form or fashion and I am completely disgusted with a lack of good options.

Not long ago, my husband and I got into a discussion about those we allow close to us versus those we keep at a distance. He remarked that he had many acquaintances, very few friends, and only a select number of people ever whom he's allowed close to him. He said, "Investing in relationships is work, no matter what the nature of that relationship is. I have enough trouble keeping up with the few who are closest to me and you, my dear, are a full-time job." I laughed because I know he meant this in the nicest possible way. Besides, he's not wrong. I come with a host of broken bits and pieces that keep falling off every now and again. I am OCD about a lot of things (or quirky, as I like to call it...softens the blow just a little). And in regards to an intimate relationship, spending so much time alone has made me a bit needy, although my husband vehemently disagrees with me on this. He says, "It's not wrong to crave attention. Nearly every creature on Earth does in one fashion or another." I asked him, "Does that make me high maintenance, then?" He shook his head. "Not even close. You are the kind of woman who requires 'care', tender, gentle, and consistent. You require someone strong, who will nurture you without smothering, let you fly, while providing you with a strong foundation to land on. And maybe all women need those things, but I can only speak to the one I married when we were barely children. It has taken me many years to learn how to navigate you properly, and even now, sometimes it's like stepping into a mine field. Some days I get my legs blown off." "Why would  you go to all that trouble," I wanted to know. "That's easy. Because you're worth it and you do that for me. You do that for the rest of the people you care for, and sometimes I think you invest too much."

We discussed the distinctions between family (of the blood AND chosen kind), friends, acquaintances, and people we used to know. Sometimes my mind wants to rack and stack those designations in order of importance, but most of the time I've learned this is not the case. We all serve a distinct purpose in the lives of others that we cross through the course of our lifetime, even if the encounter is brief. We give them something they need and they return the favor, which is true even if neither party realizes that's what is happening. And often those relationships change. Some of the women who used to feel as close to me as a sister have fallen away, which is absolutely okay. True sister bonds hold, no matter how much time has passed since you've seen one another. Sisters are, to my mind, those women in my life who'd never let me fall when possible and if unavoidable, would happily pick me up, brush me off and shove me back on the right path. They would come no matter when I called, and keep me close across however many miles are between us, even if we don't speak often (...I happily do the same for them). With sisters, you can tell them anything and they will never judge you, although they also won't hesitate to tell you when you've done something epically stupid! The bonds of friendship are just as special, even if the nature of the relationship is not the same. Friendships come at go throughout our lives according to the circles we travel through and the common ground we share with them over space and time. You can count on a friend, but frequently there are 'terms & conditions' (which vary depending on how long you've known each other and what setting your friendship was forged in). Acquaintances can look like friendships, especially if you share an emotional experience with them, but acquaintances have no investment in you of any kind, and vice versa. The 'terms and conditions', as well as the boundaries are much tighter controlled.

It is the final category that gives me the most problems...the people that I 'used to know' (or thought I knew). It is especially problematic if I used to be extremely close to someone, but through whatever evolution or circumstance that relationship eroded. Ironic that I'm pondering this after the book I just finished (Brotherhood in Death by J.D. Robb), because it, too, dealt with the grief of learning someone you were once close to changed into someone you don't even understand. Two people come immediately to mind as I write, one who was my "off and on" best friend and the other a woman whom I've known since Kindergarten. My "off and on" best friend had a pattern of just vanishing from my life at completely random times, only to pick up again after a year or two as if nothing odd had occurred. There was never any reason or explanation for the vanishing act and right before I got married the last time we "disconnected" was the last time we ever spoke. Mostly I think we just finally outgrew any meaning in each other's lives. For a short time it bothered me a lot, but after that it merely became an "every now and then" idle curiosity. As for the woman I've known since Kindergarten, as a child I always thought she lived a dream life...happy family, mother and father who doted on her, older brother who loved and looked out for her. I was envious of the "safe, stable, happy" life she had, would have given almost anything to have it too, but I certainly didn't begrudge it of her. She, however, thought I was the one who lived the amazing life, and told me so once years after we'd grown up. Even now this makes me shake my head, because the truth is if she'd ever gotten even a tiny clue to the hell I grew up in she'd have known what an absurd notion that was. The point is for a brief time these people occupied an important segment of time on my lifeline. Being able to just abandon them to obscurity in some memory box is difficult for me, even if a relationship with them "now" is out of the question. Every life that touching mine has left fingerprints on me and I'm not always sure what to do with that. As I sat here considering where I wanted this line of thought to end, it occurred to me that a quote I have tucked in my "All-Time Favorites" folder fits just right...

"I don't know how to be anything other than intense.
I don't know how to experience without feeling too much and thinking too much.
I don't know how to sit still and quiet my mind and just be (although I am getting better at it).
I'm always searching, always questioning, struggling to find meaning in everything.
I am passionate, and I am deep, and even if I'm misunderstood, I am finally ok with that." ~author Unknown

People and relationships matter to me and it makes no difference if those relationships are deep or happenstance, I take them seriously. It is a constant struggle, but that too is getting easier.

The children did not know what to play with first, a neat set of rotary pieces here, an "air chair" there, and a hundred more things scattered around all made for little hands to explore the wonderful world of science. There were creepy, crawly animals in habitats and fat plastic fish that could be plucked from the little man-made stream with fishing poles set up in strategic locations. At the entrance to the Science Museum, a giant T-Rex head was proudly displayed and had the little humans coming back again and again to speculate, "Is it real?", "Can I touch it?", "I want one"! Their enthusiasm for all the museum had to offer was contagious and their joy that I had come to spend the day with them, a surprise they weren't expecting, put me in a euphoric happy bubble I'm still basking in, even though I'm home now and it is ridiculously quiet. I have no doubt I'll still be under their spell well into the evening hours!

Not only do I wholeheartedly believe in magic, I am witness to it almost every day. Sure, one can surmise that life, itself, is magic, i.e. just waking up in the morning is some spiritual enchantment cast by the Universe, but it's deeper than that. Learning to view the world through the eyes of a child opens up so many possibilities to witness the fantastical hidden beneath layers of ordinary. I find it comforting to come to these conclusions today considering the discussion I had with my husband last night. There in the dark, before sleep took me under, we spoke of the sameness, the ordinary found in lengths and stretches of the day. In hushed tones I asked, "Is it a waste of the day to do nothing spectacular, merely move from one routine task to the next? I feel as if there should be something more if I'm to be truly savoring every day of my life." He was quiet for awhile, then he said, "Well, think of it this way...the last several days, besides going to work and doing your normal household things, you've been reading a book. And maybe to some that would seem mundane. Wasted. But to you, especially considering the nature of that book, you find something there you can relate to. You find something in it that speaks to you. Isn't that spectacular, in its own way?" I smiled at him, even though he couldn't see it and snuggled closer. "It's all about perspective," he reminded me. "Now go to sleep," he whispered, kissing the top of my head.

Somewhere in my mind, I hear Aunt Mattie offer up her favorite saying, "Life is what you make it and the world is how you take it." We create the magic, just like we build our own happiness. We are responsible for nurturing loving relationships with others, as well as one with ourselves (which is often not easy to do). If we look at the ordinary and the only thing we see is that at face value, then the magic we've missed is our own fault, because if we dig a little deeper, shift our perspective a bit more off "center" we will see it there, spewing up tiny sparks of light.