Water Under the Bridge

My body is straight up ACHY. It hurts to stand up. Hurts to sit down. Hurts to turn my head. Matter of fact, my head’s even hurting! And? My heart has a heaviness I can’t seem to shake. Sneezed several times today, and the back of my throat where my palate meets my courage ball, well, that feels like I snorted carbonated soda, oh my my oh myyyy, the burning!! I try to not complain about stuff, but waaaaaaahh! I’m in a bad way tonight, y’all. I’ve had Adele’s “Water Under The Bridge” on loop since I left work this afternoon. Clearly, my body and my brain are toxic right now and together they are  trying hard to fight off and deflect the bad and the petty and the slightly disturbing, but I feel myself succumbing to it like a persuasive undertow, like peer pressure.  I want to let it have me like quicksand, but I feel a primal urge to grasp on to whatever I can in order to save myself from being sucked under.  My feet have been numb for a few months now and I don’t know why! My left leg feels rather heavy and like it wants to lag behind.  Cold and fickle weather hate me, and I’m quite certain the feeling is mutual. I’m ready for scorching temperatures and ending the day feeling like I’ve DONE SOMETHING GOOD, my pores open and breathing as they should, like gills on a fish out of water, and not like I’ve wished the day away and then slumped to bed at an uncharacteristic hour (like a wimpy 10:30 or 11:00 at night). I'm a nightowl from WAY back!

I want to be tucked in to a warm bed, the pillows piled high up behind me, the covers tucked in tight like a burrito around me; protection.  I want to feel the touch of a cool, careful hand at my forehead, concerned, and then lips after that, just to be sure.  My mother or a guardian angel, she's one and the same after all, sitting on the side of my bed and bent over me slightly, smiling the way that good mothers do as they lean in to kiss their babies 'night-'night, breathing in Vicks and the salty smell of sleep.  

Is this a physical ailment, these aches and these pains?  Or is this grief, unrecognized and dishonored only a few months before now, told to move along and go rest elsewhere?  Is this the beginning of a depression because of impending divorce or because I'm fat again?  Is this letdown feeling temporary for tonight, just because I am exhausted and unwell and dumbfounded by just how different my life looks now?  Can I indeed will it away and redirect it as my roots grow in deeper and reach longer?

Sometimes when I am alone at night and begin to think too hard about everything, I have a reminder that shows up and knocks at my heart's door.  "You chose this," it says to me, accusingly.  "You chose this, and now you have to live with it." 

And me, always willing to admit when I am wrong or when I have failed, answer back and swallow hard.  Yes.  I DID choose this, and for a million good reasons and a million bad ones.  I have come so far.  I have been gentle with myself and I have forgiven myself for much!  I have looked at my children with an internal sting poking outward from my chest and thought, "I did this to them, this upheaval."  The first big trauma in their little big lives, and I alone caused it.  They seem to be adjusting, to my delight, but then I make myself suck in a deep and honest breath and try to differentiate if it is true, they are better off, or if it is only me projecting that onto their impressionable, sweet souls.  Sometimes it breaks my heart, the answer that floods my brain, yes or no, no or yes,  but mostly I think they are much better off than they were before, with all the fighting and tension and turmoil and hatred and resentment and general disgust between the two people who created them out of love to begin with.  The confusion, the panic, the conflict they must have felt for so long, I feel like I had to get us out of there if I did not want to grow old and see them repeat what they were subjected to in childhood. After all, how do you grow your children up to be good, hardy, and colorful individuals if the soil in which they are planted lacks nourishment? Do you keep them there in that plot and hope for the best?  Or do you transplant them and yourself to an environment where the climate is right and the soil is prime, or at least workable?

Tonight, I just don't know.  I'm overthinking again, and this is something I hate about myself, the inability to turn off my brain.  

I truly feel in the end I will find I made the right decision.  I needed desperately to mend in order to stay in recovery from alcohol.  It is my belief that my quest for self-improvement will never end.  I have always been this way, too, another admitted fault.  I was the child who spent summertime playing school and practicing my penmanship against a Big Chief backdrop, hoping to bring my game as a top competitor come fall.  I set clear goals in August and transcribed them onto lined notebook paper in numerical order, with #1 being THE most important!  Don't Make My Dad Mad, Don't Cry Because I Miss My Mommy, Play Records That Make Me Cry  In My Closet Just So I Won't Forget What Loss Feels Like.  Get All A's, Get My First Kiss, Be Nice To Everyone, Dress Preppy/Cute ONLY, Grow Out My Bangs, Try To Love Math, Say No To Drugs, Get All A's, Watch Plenty of Johnny Carson and 'Masterpiece Theater' and 'All Creatures Great And Small' with GrandMaud, Read Lots Of Books, Get Invited To Dance Parties At Homes of Popular Kids, Get Published, Avoid Drama, Find Myself A First Love, Get All A's, Make The Cheerleading Squad. Get Invited To Prom By SOVS. Get In To Vassar.  Reinvent Myself Far, Far From This Place, Pine Street.  Meet A Man Who Takes Me To Plays, Operas, The Ballet, Art Galleries and Maybe Wears Cuff Links, Or At Least Knows What Purpose They Serve.  Ooh, And Ties, Argyle and Sports-Themed Ones. Get Skinny.  Bylines, Bylines, Bylines.  Find An Agent, French Manicure Over Polish Always, Phone Home Often, Send Money Like My Mother Did.  Raise My Own Children And Not Rely On Others To Raise Them For Me.  Give Lots Of Hugs With A Few Butt-Bustings, Just To Keep It Real.  Say 'I Love You' Often To People I Cherish.  Don't Play Victim But Don't Play The Fallguy.  Leave Stuff Better Than How You Found It.  Always Put Shopping Carts Back Where They Belong No Matter How Bad You Gotta Pee.  Wish Big On Falling Stars.

​Some years, my August goals were just a repeat of the August prior to that one; other years, everything had changed up and I felt like a completely new person entirely.  Some Augusts I looked different; others, I just felt different.  My goals took on the shape of my life at the moment, and I guess they still do.  I guess that is how we keep moving forward, putting one foot in front of the other.  Mechanical, almost robotic. But it's progress, right?  And at 42, your knuckles ache as you grip the warm coffee mug at 9:00 at night looking for comfort in all you said you would never do  when you were fourteen:  Coffee past noon?  Me?  Never.  I'd NEVER get to sleep!   And then boom, you're pushing forty-three, worn out and questioning everything, but feel slightly distinguished and justified as you snap the lid shut on your Keurig that your kind and joyful friend Shiloh gave you, and pull up your pajama pants, the pair with the shot elastic and hole in the crotch.  You cradle your mug of hot coffee or chocolate and you give thanks for all that is right here in front of you, yours for the taking.  So many are not this fortunate and never find their way out of bad marriages, addiction, or self-defeating behavior.

And while I'm not home safe yet, I feel I am well on my way.  Not every day will be good, but then again not every day will be bad.  I will feel better tomorrow and hopefully will wake up with a fresh vibe geared only to slay the day and get on with life.  We watch.  

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