Mantra

Mantra
“There can be no good without evil.” Russian proverb

When I was thirteen I was quite the spit fire. I remember my nick name as a child was Bambi. My mother used to tell me it was because I reminded her of the little fawn that was so inquisitive. I remember asking so many questions to the adults around me that they used to find chores for me to do just so I would shut up. Little did they know that I would alter my questions for the task I was doing. My mother taught me to always be honest. But that is hard when you are also learning to be independent and you know that whatever you are doing goes against what your parents taught you. I wouldn’t lie but if I wasn’t asked a direct question that wanted specific detail it was easy to be evasive.
That is when my mother said I reminded her of Thumper from Bambi. I say what I mean and Mean what I say. When I was a teenager I was looked at as defiant. I could never figure out why. I never lied, I never cheated, and I never stole. I didn’t drink. I didn’t do drugs. I had a 4.0 GPA. So why was I the Bitch? When I had my own child; my view point changed. I was still as honest, but I was focused on telling facts. Unemotional facts.In my middle age years, I have learned to be tactful and patient. To state the facts while remembering that the individual I am speaking to is fragile. I wanted to state what is obvious with compassion and empathy. As a teacher, I look at each encounter as an opportunity to teach and learn. If I am not doing this then there is no potential for growth.
My mother always said. There are only 10 commandments. How hard could it be? My father always said. Hope for the best, Prepare for the worst. Take what you get and make the most of it. He is the reason I have such a hard time trusting. He hoped for the best. But i got the worst. He didn’t take what he got he just took. He took my mother for granted. He took my youth. He taught my brother to take from others as well. My father used to say he could sell ice to eskimo’s. And boy could he. My brother is exactly like him. Me I am like my mother.
I have always worked hard. I graduated high school two years early. I graduated with an associate’s degree the day before I walked for my high school diploma. I was an assistant manager by the time i was 19. I helped raise my brother after my dad died. I thought we were close. I was wrong. I guess i am still trying to prove to my father that I am better than him. I know i don’t need anyone’sapproval. But for some reason I measure my success by what he did. I make sure that I don’t do what he did. I don’t use people. I don’t exploit weakness. I don’t crave wealth. I don’t have to be like the Jones’. I just wanted to work hard. I just wanted to raise my son. Read a good book before bed. Garden on Saturday and go to Church on Sunday. I don’t need to be the center of attention. I don’t need acknowledgement of my accomplishments. I don’t have to recognize by people. I know I am a good person. I know I am a good daughter. I know I am a good mother. I know I am a good grandmother.
So why is it that I am still measuring myself to these standards? They are impossible.

 

CHOICES

CHOICES

Journal 5-28-2014

What should I have done? Everyone tells me that I had no control. I struggle everyday with the knowledge that I should have stopped him. After all I could defend myself. Good God I worked at a Maximum Security Prison. I practiced for months with my son to be able to defend myself. I could flip, subdue, and incapacitate. I remember training and the men in my class simply refused to put all of their strength into self defense class. One Correction Officer I worked with told me he didn’t want to hurt me. So every night I went home and asked my son to put all of his strength into trying to hurt me. I told him not to hold back. I felt that I would not be prepared unless I knew I could defend myself against someone my son’s size. My son is six foot five and weighed three hundred and fifty pounds. So he would throw himself into and attack and it was my job to stop him. He helped me practice for three months. At first it was easy for him to get the upper hand, but soon I was able to think quick enough to incapacitate him. I now could hold an inmate at bay.

So how could I not defend myself against my brother? I try desperately to relive what transpired and I can never stop him. I feel blow after blow again and again. I feel the impact of his massive fist slamming into my face. I feel the heat on my cheek as the blood rushes to my face. Burning the imprint of his knuckles forming four perfect imprints in my skin. I can feel my cheek swelling as the next blow slams into my temple. The white hot sear of pain blinds me. Blow after blow. My jaw, my head, my ribs all burn with pain. I know I am fading. I can no longer breath. I gasp for air. My throat tightens. Is it to scream or because I am struggling to breath. I no longer can tell if the onslaught has stopped. I am fighting to stay awake. My mind is swirling trying to focus. I recognize blood, but fail to identify it as mine.

I hear the pulse of my blood rushing through my body. The pain is intolerable. Still I refuse to believe this is really happening. He Promised. He promised. He Promised. The mantra runs rampant thru my thoughts. Suddenly the pain stops coming in waves. Have I died? No, I can still hear him. The vile words sear my heart as much as the blows that he landed. Why does he hate me so much? I can’t comprehend the meaning of his words. He was always the favorite. He was the one that everything came easy to.

I am the one that had to work so hard. I am the one that made the sacrifices. I am the one that worked for approval. I look up at him and see the Cheshire smile on his face. I understood him this time. “Told you. . . You made me do this.” I drop my head in shame. I never should have confronted him. It is my fault. I am to blame. Why do I keep doing this? Every time he does something illegal, immoral or irrational, I call him on it. Why? Why do I feel the need to correct his bad behavior.

My mind races as my lungs burn. I desperately try to get up. I’m holding my ribs with one hand while pushing myself to a seated position with the other. Nausea courses thru me. It comes in waves as I continue to push myself to my feet. I suck in my breath as I say “I’m Sorry.” I stop. Stop, so I can breath. Stop, so I can think. Stop, so I can apologize again. “You should be,” is all I hear. I shuffle to the stairs. I reach up to grab the banister. Think. Think, one foot in front of the other. Pull. Pull and breath damn it. Don’t forget to breath. Twenty minutes it takes me to climb the fifteen stairs. I quickly shuffle to the bathroom as I force myself not to vomit. Once there I can relax. My legs finally give out and I sink to the floor still clutching one hand to my ribs. I reach for the toilet. Release. Sweet release. The bile burns coming up because I have forced it down for twenty minutes. I can’t tell if I’m light headed because of the nausea or the onslaught of feelings that are hitting me.

Anger. I’m angry with myself? Why did I say something? Sadness. I am sad that the little boy I used to love and play with has hurt me again. No longer are we friends. No longer are we confidants. No longer do we talk. I wonder when it will get easier. Life should never be this hard. I shuffle to my bed and gently roll onto my side. I weep silent tears. I think. Why keeps coming up. I know that the only reason I put up with his deviant behavior is for my mother. My bother takes after my Father. I take after Mother. I have always wondered why we are so different. Dad died at forty one. Mother raised us the same way. In a deeply devout Catholic family. Religion was the center of our world. Yet we are so different. I know that I and mother took the brunt of my fathers brutality. But by brother was so little. I was sure he couldn’t remember the abuses we suffered. I figured mother coddled him because dad died and she was compensating. She always told me I was stronger. She always told me he needed more from her.

Yes, I put up with the abuse because I knew I would lose her. My relationship with mother was as important as the one with my son. When mother became ill I was the one who took care of her. I knew my brother didn’t care. He would let her die if I did not intercede. He had done it before.

When mother passed away, I made plans to move far away. Mother wanted that for me. She knew I would no longer be safe. She told me to move as fast as I can. Your brother has the house, you take the money and leave. I remember us talking about all of the abuse I have suffered. She told me the only way I will survive is to leave. She said. ” I won’t be here to protect you. Go. Go and be happy.”

Hind sight is twenty-twenty. The choices I made have molded me into the person I am today. I now search for the young happy woman that I once was. I know that one day I will get there. I need to confront my demons. I need to understand and forgive. Choices. Life is all about Choices.

 

WISDOM

Journal 5-28-2014

“Tragedy is a tool for the living to gain wisdom, not a guide by which to live.” Robert Kennedy

I once told my aunt that  “I have grown thru the girl that I was into the woman that I am.”  She told me that that was the most profound statement that anyone has ever told her. I have spent my life trying to learn from my past. Trying to learn from my mistakes. In almost every area of my life I can truly say I never make the same mistake twice. I have learned to disconnect myself from my emotions and analyze my decisions. After all how can I grow if I don’t figure out how to change a negative  and build upon the positive. My mantra has always been “I say what I mean and mean what I say.” 

Honesty has always been important to me. I become angry when someone actually thinks I am lying. I have spent too much of my life not saying what needs to be said.  I have found that being tactful helps.  Taking others feeling into consideration helps me to judge how to address and issue. My family has always appreciated my honesty. Every job I have had welcomes honesty.  The people who don’t appreciate it are the people who don’t want to hear the truth.

  I live my life simply. I have  always told people how hard is it; Their are only Ten Commandment and one Golden Rule. The reality is I was taught the morals that children raised in the fifties were raised with.  I was taught to love others as I love myself. To love as Jesus would. I have always worked hard. Learning new skills and learning how to communicate. Most people measure success by the amount of money they make. I measure it by how many people I have touched. I learned from my mother how to serve others. Simply listening, truly listening to another so that they know I respect what they are saying. I should have been born in the 50’s.

My son says that I act like June Cleaver. I laugh and ask “How would you know, you have never watched Leave it to Beaver.” We trade quips and insults laughing about the absurdity of it all. But in reality, he is right. I make a home cooked meal every night. It is rare that I don’t do the same for lunch and breakfast. To me it is cheaper and health to make great food. I clip coupons. I have a schedule of what I am cleaning and on what day. The days clothes are washed every night and folded and put away while my coffee is brewing in the morning. I put great thought in the way every photograph is hung on the wall and I have trained each of my dogs not to bark. These simple little tasks actually reinforce what my mother taught me. Respect Others.

I am constantly thinking about my past. I think it is because I have so many gaps in my memory. I often wonder why I remember some facts and not others. My goal in life is to understand the woman that I have become. Mother always said my brother could fall into a pile of shit and come out smelling like a rose. She would then say I never have to worry about you. You are like a building. I always took offense to that comment. Then one day I told her that it offended me. She smiled at me and said. Cookie, You are a building. You have a strong foundation that can withstand devastation. You constantly build upon what you have learned and are reaching for the sky. I stood by her hospital bed with my mouth open. For over forty years I have looked at my glass as half empty. But here lay a beautiful woman telling me that everything I thought was bad was really building me up. She was right. I have put up with so much adversity yet nothing seems to tear me down. I always pick myself up, dust myself off and forage on.

 

FRIENDSHIP

Journal 5-26-2014

Everyone I know has friends. My son has friends, my daughter in law has friends, my cousins have friends, my aunts and uncles have friends, even my brother has friends.

Me. . . I have acquaintances.

How do you quantify a friendship? Is it the commonalities that you share? Is it the emotional connection that is prevalent? Are individuals brought together because of a physical connection or is it because of a shared goal? What makes two individuals bond? Is it a shared event? Is it a mutual objective? Does it evolve as a result of convenience of location? Must you have these for a bond to form?

I observe. I absorb the interactions between individuals. I wonder. I dream. I wish for what I see that others have. I am envious. I want what I see. I want to feel. I want to share. I want to laugh, to love, to weep and to take pleasure in another persons’ company. I once read a definition of what someone thinks a friendship is. “Most friendships only last for a particular phase of our lives. When that developmental period is over, the friendship may dissolve. For a friendship to last a lifetime there must be something really special between you. There must be a connection that transcends time and space. This kind of a friendship also takes a certain flexibility. People change throughout their lifetimes and they must continue to search for commonalities between the themselves if they expect their friendship to endure.” I think this is the truest explanation.

The knowledge of what I have experienced prevents me from connecting to another individual. I have always been sensitive. Taken the emotions that others feel and feel them myself. But after suffering over forty years of abuses I have become disconnected. My counselors have diagnosed me with post traumatic stress, depression and anxiety that is so incapacitating that I can’t leave my house. I am deprive of power and strength. They want me to form a friendship. I have looked deep within my heart and I can’t in good conscience develop a bond with someone, anyone. How can I thrust upon someone the horrors I have had to live with? How can I expect anyone to deal with it? Why would anyone want to? I weep late at night when my emotions start to rise because of what I have lost and long for.

I can’t trust. There are times I don’t even trust my son. How sad it that? He is my hero. He and his wife have kept me safe for three years. Moving every time my brother gets near. They have had to give up everything for me. I always wonder why. I know it is because they love me but how long will that last. To say it is a strain on their marriage is an understatement. I must move on. Confront my demons. Learn to trust. Learn to communicate on a deeper level. I need to stop being superficial. I have no choice but to learn to trust. I have to become the person that I showed in my professional life. I have to become the person that I used to be. I have to learn to feel. Feel something other than sorrow and pain. Maybe over time I will develop with others what I desperately need. One true friend.