Friday, February 15, 2013

B-My-Valentine?

All thru gradeschool, I dreaded
this day
This day of carefully cut and pasted
Valentine pouches
which decorated and then hung
 on the front of our pint sized desk
or the back of our
tiny chair.....
 
Every year it was an agony for me
in those days of timid quiet
and no friends
as even then I was awkward
with others, preferring my
own company
 
"A loner" as I was 'oft described
in the comments section
of my report cards by my teachers
 
Happily content as that loner
with my imagination, my dreams, my plans
all the school year thru
except for this day of the year
 
Even now, decades later
I can still palpate the discomfort
of seeing every val-n-tine pouch
in each row fill with pink and yellow and white
envelopes
 
Every pouch except mine
 
Mine always had just two
One from my mother (sent in my lunch box)
to put in my val-n-pouch
and one from my teachers
(who made sure they had extras)
 
I never knew
(nor even thought to wonder)
if I was the only one
with only two grown up val-n-tines
in my thin and silly sad decorated grade school pouch
 
I'm not sure it would have mattered
if I had known I wasn't the only one
 
I'm still dancing on the fringe, doing things my own way
and every year I think (now) I'm glad my val-n-tine pouch
was mostly empty
because it taught me you can survive heartache
it showed me that the love/kindness of just a few
matters
(thank you mom)
(thank you teachers with emergency val-n-tines)
 
I've no thesis to prove, no facts of correlation
but I suspect we become strong or weak
early on in our life
I suspect we devise and develop ways
to stand tall in the face of disappointment
or lack of rousing peer approval
when we are more small than tall
 
Perhaps that's why each February 14th
I think back on those little construction paper pouches
knowing it foreshadowed
the worst
and the best
of life
of me
 
I hope your val-n-tine
day
(pouch full or thin)
was happy  :-)
 
 


Friday, February 1, 2013

Dreams Are Dangerous

Dreams Are Dangerous
(image by Issy aka woman seeking center)

~~

 Hopes
Desires
Needs
And Dreams
Are Dangerous


Because I'm here to tell (or to remind) you
That What You Want, REALLY Want
Or Hope To Achieve
Or Whatever Chews On Your Soul
Repeatedly
Will (most likely) Require Change.


And
CHANGE
IS
MESSY


Things will be different for you
As you act on your dreams, hopes, needs
Expectations and actions
(your outgoing and those incoming)

Will alter. Be different.
For the people you love
For the people you don't love
(and they'll all push your buttons while you make changes)


Choosing something different
Large and scary or smaller and less scary
Still rock the world

Because YOU DECIDED to do something
For

YOU
(there, you said it. This is about YOU)
Let the button pushing begin, lol

You will piss some people off, no doubt - be ready
You will hear some people cheer - probably not the ones you thought - be ready
You will wake up in the morning and be glad you did
because some part (large or small, matters not) of your life
is being driven by
YOU
Damn! What an amazing thing, after so, so, so long

No, you don't need to (necessarily):
Quit your job
Divorce
Be a lousy mom
Be a crappy friend
Have a disasterously messy house
Ignore the cat/dog/horse/hamster
Never cook again

You DO need to decide that, amid it all, you matter too.
As much as anyone or anything else that needs you, cries for you, depends on you
Because, hey, you depend on 'you' too - remember?
You have (still) a hope or dream or want or two (or a hundred)
of your own
And there's nothing (not a stinking thing) wrong with that!

Dream of owning a farm (that was my big messy desire)
Or dream of taking a half an hour EVERY DAY FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE
To do something that matters to ONLY you
Something that fills your soul, makes you smile, makes sunrise a good thing, another day a gift.

Cause (may I mention) the days count off, slip away, are gone
if they are good days you like
or bad days you hate
they go

Don't end up at the last of all of your days
with cold hard nothingness in your mind, your heart
Sadness that you delivered to yourself

Dream, be messy, have hopes and needs and (possibly) piss people off
While reaching for some/all/any of your wishes
You'll be happier, and oddly they'll (eventually) be happier too anf for you
(and if they aren't happy for you, they should be pissing YOU off)
Just sayin.....

Grand or grunge
Wipe the blackboard clean or pinstripe the frame around it
Stop discounting your life, waiting for the (never arriving) time
For yourself

There is nothing
Wrong
With
Having
A
Hope or Desire
A Need Or  A Dream

There IS something wrong
with pretending you don't matter
and walking away from your
soul

Change is messy

Now....
Go find some (metaphorical) mud or finger paints
And decorate the whole (or a corner) of your life
For yourself

The End?  No, darlin' -  This is THE beginning
(text copyright Issy aka Woman Seeking Center 2013)