5/25/2011
This was a message I received from R today.
“Just read your latest blog entry and was told to pass on to you, ‘What do you want from you?'”
WOW!
Double …WOW!!
I know it was meant to be a profoundly inspiring response and the impetus for thought provoking therapy… and it will be… just as soon as I get over the fact that I have just been summarily bitch-slapped by the universe for throwing a publicly private pity party and daring the world to join me! Right now though, I am still slightly aghast that of all the situations I have asked responses for lately- this is the one they return? I am caught between laughing at them or laughing at me, even as I struggle to let go of the original question—“What do you want from me?”
In the interest of not over-reacting, let’s take a deep breath and then center ourselves- shall we? Ok. After all, laughter is the best medicine and these are the same “they” that remanded me once to take out my garbage- because they thought it was too full. So… did I really expect less of them? Did I really expect them to ignore my literary temper tantrum and not have a clever quip to come back at me with? Noooooo…
Did I not throw that crap out to the universe as way of showing my current displeasure with recent short-term trials? Yes, but…Was this not the emotional Nemo cast into the ethereal waters to prompt and elicit an immediate response?
Yes, but…
Drat!! I hate it when they call me up short and turn the tables!
Ok… therapy time.
Soooooooo…all right, I’ll bite. What do I want from me? It’s a good question- not as easily answered as one might think, but a good question nonetheless- so here goes.
Ok…honestly? Honestly, at first I just wanted to bury my life in Charley’s death, because mine had become so convoluted and misguided. In the beginning I wanted to spend all my time thinking about his hurts, to either let go or avoid of a few of my own. I wanted to find the mystery and intrigue that no longer appeared to be part of my life. I was an adrenaline and information junky that needed the high of somebody else’s chaos to make up for the fact that my own life of motherhood and daily mundane duties reflected a life that did not seem to fit with where and what and who I had always thought I would be.
I thought… if I could just find Charley’s killer, that that would be journey enough to plug the pot holes in my own path, but then I got hooked. Then, it didn’t matter so much about my journey. It became about Charley and his journey. I did more living in his death, than I was doing in my own life and while it built a bridge between us- it was the wrong kind of bridge to build.
So, again I ask myself- what do I want from me now?
For now… I want my journey to be a truer reflection of my own in finding his. To learn how to better navigate the emotional obstacles he did not. I want to write this book and not only tell his truth- but tell mine in the process. I want to be the person who stood up for the two girls that had their young lives mangled by circumstance and ripped from them by men who had every intention of fully living out their own in comfort and false glory- even if they had to lie through their crooked teeth to their adoring wives and their innocent children to do so. I want to stand tall at the end of my day and know that what I have done here for Charley, is not just tell a story- but to have made a real difference for him and those who were left behind- ignorant of the truth and ignorant of the cost he and 3 other people fatally suffered for others comfort and lack of conscience. I want to know that what I do and what I say from this point forward will be divinely guided and that I will be emotionally compensated for the sacrifice of rutting my way through this horrible thing with fledgling intuition and hopeful prayer. I want to know that I am exactly where I am meant to be and exactly who I am meant to be- a writer, who speaks for those who can no longer speak.
What else should I want from me? Only a few things…
Things like…the confidence to know that this journey has not been in vain and that I have done right by those who were brave enough to place this in my feeble fingertips to begin with. The creative tenacity and inspiration to craft a way to make this my life’s work and to be able to devote the necessary time it takes, but not risk family or finances in doing so. To know in my heart that all of this is real- Charley- my parents- the MOT and the two young girls… to trust that all those who litter my path each day with signs understand my need for confirmations and support this tremendous call to serve.
What do I want from me?
Hmmmmmmmm….not much, huh?
How about you?
What do you want from you?
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