Hop, Skip, and Jump Away

Time passed like a flip book. I'm always on the move. The world seems wide open and full of possibilities. Exhaustion is my way of life. I'm living somewhere between a Dream and a Nightmare if you average it out. I bustle from home with my boyfriend, to school, to volunteering, work experience hours,  work interviews, and jobs. I'm beginning to buy into life again. I do all the cheesy things people do. My energy can feel bigger than any room, with a smile just as big. Going out is a regular weekend activity, we have perfected. I'm like a doll that can dress up for any occasion. My clothes give me confidence in rooms I feel unprepared to be in. I hate being stared at, but the contradiction is ignored for now. I'm oblivious because for the first time I feel put together. There are so many problems, but when you're busy they are easily brushed aside for another day. After all, I have living to do. It is the modern roaring 20's. We were unapologetically uncouth by classic proprietary standards, as we would drink, dance, and socialize into the morning hours of the weekend. Then sleep in past 10am as our bodies recuperated. The times felt larger, grander in a way, than they probably should have. I'm young with an unrealistic view of the future.

This is the part with the wagging naughty finger to your face. The kind my grandmother would do when telling me I shouldn't have done something. But, too much of a good thing can always ruin it, especially when so many things get brushed aside that they become weights of cement attached to you in water. As swimmingly as the prior moments could be, could quickly turn. It's only a matter of time. The brain is tough, but even it has limits. Limits I was testing. I'm already aware I'm not infallible, but this time I'd even shock myself. Stress is a powerful thing. Mix in a little depression and life changing events and my flight mechanism of escape went into overdrive. Or at least I suspect, looking back.

I sat staring at the wall. Tracing the imperfections on the otherwise immaculately smooth surface. It's sad the comfort I feel in the place after failing. It's a place I call home, I've found. I can make people go away, it's easier. I do better along side, not with. I always wonder if people are actually interested in things they ask or if they are just being courteous. It doesn't matter either way, but it's helpful in knowing how much to put into something. Think of it as a cross country race. If you didn't know it was 3+ miles you wouldn't conserve. You might do more of a sprint and then once realizing be unable to finish. I think this is life for most people. Then the one's that worked too hard in the beginning are poked and prodded to the finish line, while trying to regroup. Not that I have much to discuss anyways. I follow, read or watch a lot of off beat things when left on my own.

Glancing around the room while trying to get my thoughts, feelings and day organized I notice the tattered brittle binding of my childhood photo album. I reach for it. I place it in my lap as I sit on the floor of my closet. I open the cover. It still has all the stickers I placed on it over the years. A passport of sorts of my childhood. I like the stickers. I was never concerned with keeping things perfect for others. I clung to memories like currency, even back then. As if I was at risk of losing them from birth. Health things will do that to you I guess.

I didn't know it was possible to feel every emotion at once. The disappointment in others and myself. A disappointment so strong it could take the embodiment of a mob killer, stalking me. That disappointment was pulling me down, drowning me. Cement weights stuck to me.

Memories of my family, Christmas's and Summers were breaths of recesitation mixed with anger and sadness knowing those have passed. Remembering what I was able to accomplish in college were surprising moments of strength, leaving me exhausted from the struggle of what didn't come naturally. Thoughts of past friends, moments of humor, embarrassment and anger. Lies of anything is possible keeps me frustratingly floating on trying to make it truth in my life. Feeling that, that statement ignores, insultingly, many factors such as accessibility, health and monetary means, a persons past, etc at a given time. Finding in reality, the most disappointing, that I have no real interest in anything. Have you ever tried to remember information when you're not truly interested. It's impoimpossible. I find myself doing the reading comprehension exercises I once taught, so on the off chance someone does talk to me, I have infinformation to partparticipate with. It's my fault.

My fault. The part you can take blame in, is all the world seems to shove at you in your weakest. Give you amnesia to the whole picture. To close the curtain on the play in progress, which in reality is a masterpiece.

Keeping it to myself until it's too late is generally how I live, I think. I don't wish to be the project of the mental health craze that is booming, not really to the betterment of anyone. Where do I go from here? This question bounced around like a jack, snatched up with the other jacks when the ball dropped. When I seem to answer it, it would turn to the other spike, presenting a new position, that really resembled the last. Leaving me unable to grasp it.

I turn on the movie 'Meet Joe Black' and get to the part of Anthony Hopkins giving the speech at his party. I don't know why, I cry. Maybe I do, "Doesn't it go by in a blink", I can see and hear my Grandpa in those lines. I miss his little random speeches that came out of no where from a man that otherwise was simple. Some how felt it always felt reassuring and inspirational. At times, he was angry and embarrassing at restaurants, due to diabetes, but always content with life. He seemed happy to greet the day, even when saying the opposite. I mean for a man who hated dogs he sure went out of his way to care for them. He always had a curious obsession with keeping his grass perfect. Yet, he fenced off his backyard and let them destroy his prized grass. He talked to them when no one was looking and bought them treats.

What am I doing? Reminiscing like this never really helped anyone. Not like this.

I remember my Dad telling me once he had read the best advice and wanted to share it, "learn to forgive for yourself. Learn to forgive yourself for what you and others are not". I know it sounds like self help, but this is not usually things my dad shared. I now thought about that, as I did that day. Younger me didn't quite get it. I remember saying, "oh yeah dad, okay, sure I'll do that", but it was just the motions of understanding. The older me found the profound in the statement. It's not anyone's fault they are not what you expect, just as it's not a person's fault that they dont fit with what I decided. If you can forgive this fact about life, happiness comes a little easier and I could then see things worth embracing. Laugh at what I am not, at least I will know really who I am. Laughing in disbelief was about all I could do at this point. Forgive myself and embrace it.

I'd love for this to be the movie montage where I wake up and everything changes. I walk down the street winking at neighbors, while I buy a smoothie and a muffin, smile on my face with an obvious pep in my step, throwing in a check you later gesture for good measure to the hot neighborhood hottie. The female emo spider-man, like Toby Mcguire. But, life is just inspiration for movies, it's not like the romance movies every day. The ending is not predictable. Progress is slow. Forgiveness, apparently a snail that relapses to the same spot every few hours.

I needed something non-threatening to obsess over. To focus my attention on and away from other things. First, I began mentally dividing qualities into positives and negatives. What qualities do I actually appreciate in others and in myself. Then decide how to make those more prevalent. What would I be willing to sacrifice or more importantly willing to endure to get to be where I want to be. As Marcus Aurelius would promote, Endure. I'm not Marcus Aurelius tho, nor will I be going down in history as the last of five good emperors. That I could guarantee. The world is wide open to me, but I might settle for simple contentment. What obsession would get me there?





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