Writing Scared

This year has been hard for me, my family, and my friends and this blog has suffered for it. I have seen friends (both online and real-life) lose their children. I have battled against mental health and marital issues, I have nearly lost my job due to both. I have had two of the most important men in my life lose their mothers within a week of each other. I have had one friend commit suicide while I battled against the demons that told me that I could do the same.

I have watched the Supergirl go to and graduate from preschool. The baby chickens of last summer have had (and subsequently lost) chicks of their own.

My writing has changed.

I am scared to write of the daily tribulations of being a mom to a rambunctious, curious, and (oftentimes) irritating 5 year old because one friend will never see her baby be a 5 year old and the other mourns the loss of those days. I am scared to write about my fears of losing my job, because so many people in my life have lost their jobs lately and they were not having performance issues (no matter the cause, my performance had deteriorated). I am scared to write of the marital issues, the pain and the hurt, the distrust and the anger, when so many that I love dearly long to find that special person and here I was just throwing it away like it is all just inconsequential.

I am scared to write of the realities of what my life has been this year, because I don't want anyone I care about to be hurt anymore than they have been.

Which leaves me stuck, stuck in a world where my words fight against my skin, aching to be let out, released, and my mind continually shuts them down, forcing me to keep them all bottled up inside.

I need to write so that I can be healthy. I need to write so that I am not carrying it all on the inside. I need to write so that I can make sense of so many things that have happened.

So, I write scared. I pray that my words will not inflict pain on those who already are bearing more than their share, I pray that they will find their intended audience and that the correct tone will carry through the screen and into the brains of the three of you reading this. I pray that as the words tumble from my fingertips, that I will be understood (as much as anyone can understand me).

And maybe, one day, I can go back to writing without the fear.

Little Wishes...

She always said that when she retired she was going to buy a motorcycle. She wanted the biggest, the shiniest one that she could afford. She wanted to just drive, to just go and and be free. Friends and family laughed, the thought of this tiny woman driving something so ostentatious, so large, so loud.

She was too sick when she retired. Sick from 3 and half years of chemotherapy treatments, tired from a cancer that was never going to go away. She didn't get her motorcycle.

After she and the Supergirl took their Spring Break trip, she explained to the Hubs and I that she was stopping the chemo. She didn't tell us how long, didn't give us a timeframe, but seeing the urgency in the plans that she was making, I knew. I just knew.

On April 18, I sent an e-mail to the president of the local chapter of the Chrome Divas. I explained who I was, who my mother-in-law was, why time was of the essence. On April 20, unsure of whether my e-mail had even been received,  I was pulling into my part-time job when my phone rang. "We are having a party at the Harley dealership, can you get your mother-in-law down here? We have some special things planned for her."

It was the last good day that we had together as a family. She was admitted into Hospice the following Monday and died at home on May 15, 2013.

Thank you so much to all of you who helped to make it such a great day. You are truly in our hearts, thoughts, and prayers everyday.

How?

How do you explain to this face that the one thing that she has been praying for for months is not going to happen the way that she wants it or expects it to?

How do you explain that despite the prayers and tears, despite the longing and reassurances, that there is no more medicine to help?

How do you look a piece of your heart in the eye and let them know that their best friend is dying?

How?

The Worst Word

I have lived for nearly 37 years, with nearly 30 of those being in the South and I have never once even considered using the “n” word. Ever. I know that there are other people that don’t feel as strongly about it as I do and that the stereotype is that we all just walk around saying it down here. It's not true, but for some reason if you have a Southern accent, or you like some Skynyrd or country music - well, you must use the "n" word, right?

Wrong. 

The entire time that I was growing up, while my father tried to knock me down with his fists and his words he would scream at me, “you are as bad as a…”, “as ugly as a…”, “as lazy as a…”, “as stupid as a…” “as sorry as a …” Even at 6 or 7 years old, I knew that I would never say that word. I didn’t know who or what he was referring to, but, in my heart I knew that if it was as bad or ugly as me then I had never, ever met someone like that.

I have still never met a single person on this Earth that is deserving of that moniker. I have never once encountered someone that deserved the venom and hatred that that one word possesses. I have never in my life been so angry that I would dare to curse someone with that kind of evil.

My daughter brought home that word from preschool. Preschool. Riding home from Grandma’s house in the silence of the backseat, I hear her ask, “Momma, what does n____ mean?” She even said it wrong (not that there is a correct way to say it), sounding more like mega, which is what her father mistook it for until she interrupted him. “No, N, Nah, Nah. N______, Daddy.”

His face fell. A piece of my heart broke off and shattered. The tone of my voice in reply shocked me, turning icy and hard. My words felt like tiny shards of glass cutting through the air.

“It is a very, very bad word. It is a very hurtful word. You should never, ever use it. Where did you hear it?”

“Ti-Ti at school was singing a song-” She breaks away into a lyric of a song that I have never heard, but that the Hubs apparently knows. He nods at me.

I take off my seatbelt (I know, I am setting such a great example here, but I really needed to deal with this moment in the moment, intentionally). “Supergirl, I need you to listen to me, I need you to understand, okay?” She nods, suddenly recognizing the seriousness based on the fact that I am now breaking the law as we travel down the road.

“Not very long ago, there were people that were not very smart. They didn’t think that brown people were the same as pink people.” She stared at me in disbelief. I nodded at her and continued, “They thought that brown people were bad and stupid. They treated them very badly, like they were animals. These people used to call the brown people the N-word. It’s an insult. It hurts people and it makes them cry. It makes people that say that word look ignorant. Worst of all, some of the people that use that word, don’t even understand how bad of a word it is. I do not ever want to hear you say that word again, do you understand?”

“Yes, momma. But why would they put that word in a song if it was so bad?”

“I am not sure, baby, but that is not a word or a song for you. Have you ever heard that word in any of the songs that we listen to?”

“No.”

“Supergirl? If anyone ever calls you that word, you will come and tell me about it, right?”

“Momma! Why would anyone ever call me that? I am not brown – I am an Indian. Duh!”

They Can't Call It MDA, Because That Name's Already Taken

Hello. My name is Heather and I am an addict.

I love that liquid gold crack that I can buy at any corner store. That bright yellow stuff of the Gods. I am talking, of course, about my Mountain Dew habit (fine, addiction).

Being the semi-moronic nut job that I am, I decided that today would be a fine day to start giving up my addiction. I am currently battling a raging sinus infection that I am trying to just let play out because I am terrified of building up an immunity to antibiotics, lest I be the one person on Earth that can defeat drug-resistant bacterias one day, and therefore am hopped up on all kinds of ingredients for meth.

Last night as I was trying to lay still and allow my body to heal, I noticed that I am all kinds of twitchy which led to the following conversation with myself.

"Self, you are crazy twitchy."

"It might be the Mountain Dew."

"Are you sure it is not the 8000 throat lozenges that you took today trying to get rid of your sore throat and cough? Or maybe it's the cough syrup that you get withdrawals from exactly 3 and half hours after you take it? It can't be the Dew, the Dew is our friend."

"That's bullshit, man, bullshit. They just want us to believe that."

"Who are they?"

And that starts off a whole other conversation in my head that causes me to lie awake pondering the "theys" of the planet. (It's always something, isn't it?)

This morning I woke up knowing that today is the day I quit. I knew it this morning. I bravely drove past the convenience store with their 44-ounce 69-cent wares. I sipped from my bottle of half frozen water feeling empowered, awakened.

But now it is 2:30. I don't feel good. Everything aches.

And I want my Mountain Dew. I want it SO bad.

I need an Anonymous group. They just can't call it MDA.

What is your addiction? Have you beat it before? For how long?