Haunted

​I’m not lazy.

My brain screams the words but my mouth can’t seem to form them. My lips part and I exhale without making a sound.

Perhaps that’s because there’s so much sound reverberating in the space OUTSIDE my head. SHE’s making a racket of noise as though a drill sergeant is bellowing into a bullhorn.

And I’m just tired.
So tired.

I can’t seem to win and I just want to rest. But she never relents. Not even to take a breath herself. 

​Lazy. 
Unappreciative. 
Ungrateful for all the sacrifices they’ve made for me. 

Those are the kindest of the words winding their way through the air molecules to my ears.

On and On and ON as though it was a prerecorded track stuck on repeat. The rest of the words were so so so much worse - dripping with poison and making me wonder: 

Is this how she really saw me?
And if so, was I in truth any of those things?

​I had come back to my childhood “home” - a term I use loosely - during my college break. My world was shattered by their craziness suddenly being known to complete strangers on campus. 

Not because I told. 
I would never have told. 
That was rule number 1. You don’t tell on your parents because BAD THINGS might happen.

The fact was that others now knew because there were cracks in her perfect facade. SHE TOLD on herself. The mental illness making her believe that if she reached out to others with her craziness, they would tie me up, bundle me into a box, and ship me back to her.

Where I could remain locked up in that space she called a “home” forever.

She nearly succeeded. Prior to the break I was called into the Dean’s office and told to “get my parents under control” or I would be booted out of school. The school I was paying for on my own. 

I never knew that I could be punished for the actions of others of which I had no control over. It was a wake up call that I’ve never forgotten.

So here I was, in the shower, hoping the hot water doesn’t run out and that the door lock holds, as she hollers horrible words, getting more and more creative with the slurs and epitaphs as she goes, and I’m praying to a god I don’t believe exists…

Please please please make it stop.

Why does this memory come back to haunt me all these years later, you might wonder.

Especially on a beautiful day, like today. When the sun is shining, and I’m so in love with the world and my life. Why today, does this memory pop into my head?

Perhaps it’s because I’m a bit tired. And the concept of being “tired” was never acceptable.

Tired meant unmotivated - which was sin in and of itself, especially for me. Because she knew I was hyperactive and so my energy is always there - even when I’m worn out. 

Like a machine that could be serviced even as it functions, I wasn’t supposed to pause.

But lately, in this present time, more specifically the past month, I’m wiped out. Happy but exhausted. 

And I’m not getting enough rest because today alone I know I have content to create, a blog piece to write, and some reach outs to connections to take care of. 

Yet all I want to do is sit quietly, and read. 

Not an instructional book or something to improve my life. I just want to sit curled up in sweats on my comfy little settee with the worn patches and fraying gold threads. 

I want to immerse myself in a silly story, occasionally gazing out the window at the blue sky. I want to indulge in the fact that I am contently and peacefully reading inside where it’s warm, as the air is still too chilly for me to be on a park bench somewhere. 

In my head I realize there’s a dozen things to do. I could be sweeping the floors or starting laundry. Making goal lists and working on marketing. Re-doing my budget for the 1 millionth time to ensure I don’t waste a penny. Working out or practicing yoga, because I’m softer right now from the winter months. And THAT’S not just a sin, but a cardinal one in her mind at least.

Certainly I could be researching and creating and designing and and and…

I put my head in my hands. And for a moment my heart sends this message out to the Universe - that beautiful energy which I DO so believe in:

Please make it stop. Let her stop haunting me.

It’s funny the moments from one’s past that cycle up on lovely days. On the surface this day has been so brilliant.

Last night, I had eaten a big dinner with friends and it was delicious. And then I was dancing and vibing and being hugged by people around town. So when I woke this morning after an evening out, I expected a peaceful yet productive day.

And maybe that’s the problem. 
I don’t know how to take a day off. 

Because even yesterday before the fun, I made sure I worked on projects. Cleaned my home. Spent time networking. So I could “earn” the time off later in the evening. And when I ate all the marvelous healthy food, I did so only because I knew that I would be dancing the calories off for hours.

Sometimes the scars we have aren’t seen by the naked eye. Yet they continue to burn into our psyche. And long after we escape those who harm us, we continue to punish ourselves.

I’m tired of having to earn the right to rest. 
It’s draining and demoralizing. 

I’m tired of having to prove to the ghost of those who wouldn’t let me be a child, that I have the right to playtime. 

I’m sick of having to justify that I’m worthy and that I’m doing/achieving/accomplishing/succeeding enough, to be of value.

I’m drowning in the things I do in order to say that I’ve EARNED the right to be happy.

No wonder I’m so tired.

Because now, in a time when my life is going incredibly well, I feel guilty for it. 

How dare I want to just sit and be present in this moment simply because it gives me joy. 

How dare I think it’s ok to feel immensely pleased that the sky is blue when I did nothing to cause it to be that way.

How absolutely egotistical to take pleasure in being alive, when I didn’t even ask to be born. My existence is a gift, and if I listen to the phantoms inside my head, it’s a gift that I haven’t yet shown I deserve.

They say it’s the shoemaker’s kids who run around with no shoes. In my case it’s the muse’s spirit who exists without permission to breathe.

For years I’ve told others that they were enough. That they didn’t have to earn their right to exist. That they had nothing to prove, and they were under no obligation to live up to someone else’s expectations.

I’ve meant it each time I spoke or wrote such things. But only as they applied to others. Maybe it’s time I believed they also applied to me.

I’d love to tell you that while looking out the window at the blue sky I laid that memory to rest, or exorcised it altogether from my consciousness. But that only happens in movies and in those happily ever after coming of age stories.

I could however, bring myself out of the past and ground myself in the here and now. 

So I closed my eyes and envisioned turning off the water in the shower. Drying off. Opening the door. 

And instead of the lunatic being outside berating me, I visualized my beautiful space I exist in currently, and me stepping back into the present.

Where I opened my eyes.
Threw on my sweats.

And spent the afternoon, happily reading a silly little book on my funny little settee, occasionally smiling up at the blue sky outside my window.

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