Carefully Taught

Growing up hypervigilant, waiting for the people in charge of your life to veer off kilter and bring wrath and ruin.

Yeah. I didn't realize what that would mean to me as an adult.

Reading the room, watching for agreement or budding objections: that made me really good at sales. And corporate survival. (At the expense of sharing my own views, at times= woman that knows her 'place').

Sure, sure, sure: my nerves were just screwed at a young age, and ok- sure; I was bulimic (but it wasn't anorexia, so I'm good, right?), and yeah yeah yeah; my parents called me a drama queen and a klutz, but royalty is royalty, amiright?

Okay okay- so maybe I got married at 19 hoping against hope and believing the lie that 'I'll love you forever' meant that my life would have security, and my value was finally seen and appreciated, and life would be what I'd always dreamed about for myself.

Stable job, steady partner= what could go wrong? and alright already: emotional affairs don't mean that love is gone.

oh wait- it does? Maybe I can earn back that security by keeping everything perfect? Perfect house. Tranquil. GLIDE, GIRL, GLIDE! So bulimia is back and the rage translates to horrific strictness and punishment on the smaller denizens of the house in an effort to make things perfect?

cool cool cool. Not for not trying, though. Oh yes- you tried. Every trick in the book that had kept you as safe as possible until now. Watching. Anticipating. Disappearing.

So that didn't work: alone for real now and horrid person how can you be surprised it didn't work?

On your own for the first time and hoping, working, struggles, unwise choices... then happiness. Even though you were afraid to TRY AGAIN and TRUST. You took the chance. Through job loss and night terrors and now it's you and me side by side.

Plans to live the last parts of your life no longer AFRAID. Working together to FINALLY HAVE THAT SECURITY that dripped through your fingers for decades.

Plans. Dreams.

Community, trying new things. Building that life.

Hope.

NOW? Now though? Now I wake up every morning with that old familiar fear rising in my chest and my throat closing with worry and my mind screaming

"Are you prepared for what is coming? What has he done? What will he do?"

The dreams are back.

The startle at noises.

The reading the room and now taking in ALL THE INFORMATION FROM THE EVERYWHERE (Oh- the amount of information now! but I am stronger and I can hold it) watching closely so you are ready to.... to... do what?

There is no where to run. Appeasing has never worked for long. (You know that, as you look at your hands while you type with that crookedy-healed broken thumb from that time long ago).

Speaking up has cost you more than you ever thought you'd bear to pay. Past chickens have come home to roost and there's a piper that needs paid- but please God how must there still be a price for something I never meant to purchase?

How much rice= security?

How many tomato plants= good night's sleep?

Will solar panels work?

What exactly IS a life straw?

Where are my crochet hooks to create sleeping mats out of these horrid-for-the-environment-plastic-bags, just in case we need them?

Twice in my life I 'nested' in preparation of hard, ripping my body, work. Twice in my life I prepared for major life upheaval, bringing order to my surroundings instinctually. Women have done is for as long as women have existed.

Making things safe for the arrival of someone that would depend on us, someone we would protect. I never though that I would do this at 64, again. Never thought that I'd work again to clean, straighten, lay in stores, feather that next of my home again in preparation to nurture a small young one.

But I am.

This time it's for me.

That little girl waking in fear, afraid that there will 'not be enough'. That the angry man will go too far this time. This is familiar, deep down and in a place that I thought was sealed and forgotten.

I am watching the world and assessing the threats again. No more running. Closing the ranks by extending hands and hearts to those that see it, too. Making room for those still blind but maybe, just perhaps: blind but soon they'll see.

Someday we can take the deep breaths again.