My Private Tsunami

I’m thinking about careers in which being argumentative is a plus. There are always the day show host slots–bringing people on to television and having them duke out their problems physically or verbally. There’s always the legal profession, of course. Lawyers make their living being argumentative (and slimy and unethical and and and). There’s the military! Now if ever there were a place to be argumentative, that would be it!

I’m just naturally argumentative these days. I spent the first 40 years of my life pleasing others, and it’s not that I don’t want to please anyone any more. I’m simply not interested in it for the sake of being…nice.  I’m just not willing to pay the high price tag often associated with people pleasing–which is–being true to myself. I spent such a long time keeping everything in that I’m not willing to be silent when “calling bullshit” is what is true. I realize that everyone has their own perspective about nearly everything, and that mine isn’t better than another person’s or more true. It’s just more true to me. I’m not accepting other people’s version of me, nor my actions, over my own because I’m pretty damned honest with myself these days. I don’t try to start fights, but I don’t shy away from them if someone else starts them. I’m not an “angry bitch” but I’m no longer as uncomfortable with anger as I once was (used to avoid it like the plague).

Let me tell you, I am spitting angry today. And I really just realized it. It has to do with a conversation I had the other night, and it probably would be best that I write about it in my journal. I try to keep private stuff between me and concerned individuals private, and only write about people problems here in the broadest sense possible. Unless, of course, those problems have to do with MCF. I’m not so good-natured that I won’t call that asshole an asshole. And I’m really burning to do some self-righteous venting at this particular moment in time. But for now, I’ll refrain. It’s that dignity thing I mentioned earlier. Fuck having moral standards. They may be incongruous moral standards, but they are mine. Fuck me!

What’s probably true is that, at this moment, if I weren’t angry, I’d be crying. And I’m having a hard time with that. I’m having a hard time giving myself permission to cry. For all my clever speeches about giving myself time to grieve, I’m impatient with myself. I’m trying to work some compassion for myself into the day.  I haven’t had a bubble bath, I haven’t had a pedicure, and I haven’t allowed myself any tears with friends. I’m doing exactly the opposite of what I’d advise a friend in my circumstances, and I’m supposed to be my own best friend. No, I’ve been the opposite–impatient, grudging, and stonyhearted. It is so time to change, and I mean right this second.

I haven’t been drawing when my soul is calling out for paper and colored pencils. I haven’t made my environment soothing when I so need the world’s beauty. I haven’t cared for my body lovingly when I desperately need nourishing and pampering. No wonder I’m irascible these days. It’s like being to the self what it would be like for the world to refuse aid to Japan. Mercy. Just another reminder of the cost of self-isolation. Okay, enough. “Uncle.”

I’m going to let the rest of your carry the burden for a little while. I can’t make things right in Michigan, Wisconsin, Haiti, Japan, or even New Mexico. And taking a night off from being concerned about everyone else to be concerned about and take care of myself probably won’t have much of an impact on the world anyway. My father always told my mother (condescendingly I might add) when she was worried, to “put it on her worry list.” Will y’all take on my worry for tonight? I could really use a break. Thank you.

“Love is not love that alters when it alteration finds.” ~ William Shakespeare

Gratitudes:

1.) My children, always.

2.) Pedicures.

3.) Friends.

4.) Dogs.

5.) Books and flowers, pencils and paper.

Peace, T.

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