Sunday, February 21, 2010

Push

I feel the urge to write today but have no predetermined topic within which to operate. So yes, this may be very, very random, maybe even insane, but I guess that is about right. It wouldn’t be to far from the place my mind stays lately.

I just finished the book Push by Sapphire, the book from which the movie Precious comes. It was phenomenal, a word I don’t use to describe most modern fiction. Maybe that is why I felt the need to write today, I was reminded by the book that writing for your own sake can be the key to your sanity and salvation, that taking note of and understanding where you have been and where you are can push you to that place where you need to be next. It has always been the purest form of therapy for me, nothing but me and words and thoughts and feelings, all my own, all untouched and unbiased and unedited. I know I need this now, yet the words have been slow and difficult in coming. Probably because my mind rarely knows what it is thinking anymore, so how can it possibly find the words?

I don’t find it easy to turn to others for support and help. This has always been my nature – I let people in so far but rarely does anyone ever get the whole story, rarely does anyone ever know who I really am at my deepest core. I don’t know why this is. Maybe I am afraid of rejection, afraid that if they all see me for who I truly am they won’t want me after all. Maybe I just don’t want to be a burden. I am the caregiver, the nurturer, the one who is there for all no matter what, not the one who drops her problems and issues on others to soil their day. The problem is when I finally reach that point where even I am not helping myself yet I have no one else to whom I can turn, I stop being that caregiver, I stop being there for others and become so lost in my head I can think of nothing other than the jumbled, nonsensical thoughts that twist and turn inside my head. Eventually the deafening thunder and that cloud of thoughts pass and I am able to be me and be there for others once again. Then I am left feeling horrible and apologizing a million times over to those who needed me while I was gone in oblivion, lost to my own demons and tendency to turn inward rather than out.

Tomorrow is Monday and I am already looking forward to this week being over for a number of reasons. It is a big week at work and I am ready to get these state assessments over and get back to teaching and enjoying my classroom. I am looking forward to next weekend for a number of reasons, yet almost dreading it at the same time. I am at a curious place – there is this entity in my life that simultaneously inspires in me the greatest love and happiness and the greatest fear and sadness. I don’t yet know how to reconcile those seemingly conflicting emotions into one easily-handled, neatly-tied-up-with-a-ribbon-and-bow package, and I may never figure it out. It is what it is and what it is is mine to deal with. I wish some people could understand this. My fears and problems and choices cannot be resolved by another. They are uniquely MINE – owned by me, understood by me, known by me alone. Maybe this is why I don’t turn to others with what is floating around, locked inside my head. I know that I could tell them everything, all that is inside of me for which there are words and it still wouldn’t be enough. They still wouldn’t get what it is to see and know and feel and believe what I see and know and feel and believe.

So you see I have carved for myself a very lonely place. There are days I venture out and enjoy the sunlight and warmth that exists outside of my own head. There are days when I want nothing more than to be left alone to wrap the cold yet familiar blankets of my mind around me. For if no one else knows me, I do. I get it. I know what it is that is bothering me at this moment, I know what it is I am feeling, hoping for, dreaming of, crying over. If I know, is it even important if anyone else sees it too? As long as I am here to give it existence, does it matter that no one else knows it is alive?

It must matter because too often lately I have been looking to find existence and meaning and understanding and life in another when I feel all those things have all but left me. Yes, it is a lonely place, and even I am not always strong enough to be alone with it all. The question is, after a lifetime of keeping it to myself, to whom do I turn to let it all out? Who is strong enough to deal with all I cannot myself handle? And how do I ever, ever allow myself to heave all of this onto another when it is mine and mine alone and I don’t even want it?

For anyone who might read this and worry, please don’t. I am fine. This is just stream of consciousness, what is in my head at this very moment. It will all work itself out somehow. It always does.

More soon.

2 comments:

  1. You are a teacher. Look at your life like your classroom. It is a small room filled with 20 little people running about. You know what you want to do and need to do and you give it your all. You know you trust your methods more than anyone else's. Yet there just isn't enough of you go to around and do the job as effectively as you would like. So you bring in 3 people to help you. You tell them what you expect and what your methods are. There are now 5 little people per adult. Everyone is now getting what you want them to have, and you are getting some relief. You are able to see that opening up your wants and desires to others is working. The little people are happier, you are happier. Those 3 you brought in may not fully understand your concepts, but they are trying, and again, your load is lighter.

    Our lives are the same scenario Allison. We can't be everything to everyone all the time. No one can. Just as no one can be secure only in their self and doubting of others. Oh we can be like that, but we will blow a fuse in the process and not be very happy either. Which becomes the greater pain when we do? Our lonely isolation, or, the risks of disappointments when we do share? I prefer the latter actually.

    Big hugs to you!

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  2. Debbie, I love you, and you are indeed the wisest woman I know. I am working on all this, I promise. The problem seems to be I manage everything in my life to the nth degree but I cannot get a grip on my head. Some days I do better than others. I am working on letting people in but it seems I have done better lately and shutting more and more people out.

    Thank you, Debbie. Hugs back at ya!

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