In the Belly of the Beast

This entry is a lot darker than some.  It may also be a lot harder to understand.  I'm not sure I really understand it completely.  It demanded to be written.  Things are not always upbeat and positive for me.  I have days when I struggle with my inner demons. This last week was a very difficult one for many of us in my family.  My husband and I got into a nasty argument.  I lost my temper with my son and screamed at him.  I was very ashamed of myself and wondered how I dare write about listening to my family members and children when I could act so badly.  I had to force myself to sit down with these unwelcome feelings and make peace with them.  This entry is the story of that struggle.

Some emotions are so raw that you can't swallow them.  Instead they swallow you.  Last night I sat in their belly.  It's a frightening place to be.  I want to walk confidently into each  tomorrow but some times I fall overboard.  I struggle against feelings that I hate.  The more I struggle the harder my life can be.

In my mind I have a standard, an ideal that I reach for.  Some days I do a good job.  There are other days when I am swallowed whole.  Darkness envelopes me with a savage swallow.  I try and count my enemy's bones. "1-2-3. . ." I lose count and begin again, "1-2-3-4" and forget.  "1-2-3-4-5."  My heart spins and falls, gracefully spiraling down the darkness.  Could there be a raw and savage beauty here?   I sense it but can not see it.

Exhausted, I don't want to fight any longer.  I collapse into a pool of acid and half-digested chunks of life.  My cries echo against the belly's walls.  They shout tales of loneliness, abandon. They spew curses at fate and fortune.  They shake their fists at God and demand to know why.  Only silence answers.  It points the blame at me with a stone-like silence.  I rise to bash my soul against it.  Finally, broken and defeated, pieces of me lie at my feet like shards of broken glass.  This can not be mended.  There are too many pieces.

I fall into a dreamless sleep and awaken in the dark.  I begin the work of cleaning up the broken pieces. There really is nothing else to be done.  I remember a quote long forgotten, "Broken again and again upon the sea, the moon mends so easily."

The words spill into the wound left by last night's pain.  It cleanses.  It purifies.  It forgives, if but just a little.

I am accused and accuser, judge and jury, angel and demon.  Today becomes an atonement for all the days before.  On the altar of life I am the sacrifice.  I raise all that I am and let go.  Broken pieces fall to earth.  The Light and the Darkness dance in worship.  I drink in all that is holy and damned and offer it back again.

Tomorrow is Another Day

I'm reading a book I hate but can't put down,  The Half Empty Heart by Alan Downs Ph.D. As I read it I often see myself in the pages.  I'm not comfortable with what I see but I can't look away.  In the evening, I'll sometimes read a sentence aloud and share it with my husband.  He roams these pages, these truths just like I do.  Maybe it is this that binds us most closely.  We approach life in similar ways.  Often we see pieces of the other in each other's eyes.

Yesterday, I read about self sabotage.  I really hated this chapter.  I've written one like it with my own life.  After reading several of the more profound sentences out loud, I turned to my husband and with a plaintive voice whine, " If you realize you've been doing this, sabotaging your life and you have been doing it for years, how do you catch yourself in time to stop yourself from doing it again?"
His head vigorously shakes a "no" and he says, "I don't know.  I just don't know."

I wanted him to tell me "How", to throw me a lifeline, provide a neat formula, plot a plan of action.  He did none of those things.  How could he?  In one breath I say, "I'm one of the cagiest people I know.  I can fool myself better than anyone.  I can justify almost anything in my own mind.  I don't want to do that any more.  I want to stop but I'm afraid I'll fool myself again."

My words hang in the air just above our heads.  They form a fragile line.  I reach for them.  They are just out of reach.  The meaning of the words has split our quiet evening.  Up until this moment,we've sat watching mindless TV.  We've busied ourselves, he with crossword puzzles and word jumbles, me with knitting instructions, recipes and reading this dreadful book.  Neither of us want this painful truth to break into our ordinary evening.

We try to distract ourselves with old Game Boys.  We each pick one up and play.  In between the repetitive noise that surrounds explosions and flashes of light, I pilot my spaceship through a universe full of hazards and certain death.  I don't last long in the fantasy world.  My spaceship is an easy target.  I am obliterated quickly, again and again.  This world is no place to hide and I know it.  I close the Game Boy and turn my attention to the confusing mob of characters in an unknown show.  I don't know who any of them are.  What's their back story, their motivation?  What's the point of the show?

I start to pepper my husband with questions.  He reacts a little like an old grizzly awakened rudely after a long winter slumber.  "I don't know," he says.  "I just don't know."

I know I'm being annoying but I can't seem to stop myself.  I know he can't know.  I want to connect.  I want the space between us to be full of sounds that mean something.  I don't know how to say that.  I don't know how to define what I want.  A lifetime has been spent separating myself from what I want and how I feel.  This can't fit in the space between us at least not tonight.

I try. I stop asking questions he can't answer.  I watch the show.  "I'd like to live in that town,"  I say.
Pictures of a pretty English coastal town flash across the screen.  Sheep graze in green pastures.  A cluster of buildings hug the hills that drop into a calm, teal sea.  A warm sun touches all.  "Yes," my grizzly partner says.  "But think of how wet and rainy it really is most of the time." 
He and his pessimism have crashed into my own.  Frustration rises and threatens to move my tongue.  I swallow quickly.  It tastes too familiar.

I sigh and say, "I'm tired and feeling very needy.  Will you come to bed with me?"
Normally, I go to bed first, leaving him with an hour of quiet solitude before he joins me.  He is more night owl than I.  "Sure, I'll lie down with you for a while."
Together we lie down in the dark.  The sheets feel cool against my skin.  I curl up slightly and concentrate on warming a small circle of comfort under the sheets and within my own heart.  I reach across the space between us and rest my hand on his chest.  His distant warmth soothes me and I quickly slide into sleep.

As my breathing slows and deepens, I think to myself, "Tomorrow is another day. . . another chance to try again. . . to feel again. . .to make mistakes and learn again.  I'll think about this again. . . tomorrow.