Here it is the first of April, Spring, but not Spring-like. It’s cold, rainy, dreary and has been this way for what seems now like weeks upon weeks but has probably only been about six days. I am staying home today. My body feeling much like the weather. I am sick with a terrible cough, sore throat, fever, aches and pains. I was not feeling well yesterday either but didn’t suspect that I was getting sick. I thought my lethargy was more a manifestation of anxiety and emotional stress than a physical ailment, but then body, mind and spirit are all connected so my current demise may very well have started with the mind/spirit portion then connected and succumbed to the weather’s insistence of dragging winters heavy cold hand into the Spring and into my lungs.
Yesterday morning I woke up before the sunrise, with the rooster as usual and felt that comforting childlike excitement .“Oh, boy! A new day! Full of new adventures!” I thought but as I tried to ‘bounce’ out of bed I was halted by sore muscles, an aching head and a bit of a heaviness of heart.
“Raining again! Ugh!” I said to my cat Compost, that’s the cat’s name it’s a funny story I'll share another time. Compost, oblivious to or perhaps accepting of the relentless dreary weather responded with purrs and yawns then snuggled deeper into the covers.
“Good plan Compost!” I said as I flopped back into my bed, the sheets in a mass of tangles from the restless night I had just spent doing more tossing and turning than sleeping. I put the pillow over my head and paused for about two minutes. Frustrated about being an adult with responsibilities I kicked my feet throwing off the sheets. “I can’t stay in bed…I’m not a cat! I have things to do.”
I stumbled out to the kitchen. Coffee….one of my very best friends. Grinding the beans and boiling the water for the French press, (I’m a coffee snob, that’s the only way I like coffee) I watched the morning horizon turn from black to gray as the sun came up under it’s thick cloud covered sky. I heard Elizabeth stirring in her room and smelled the perfume she had chosen for the day. Elizabeth is almost 14. She’s a loving little teenage girl. She has her typical hormonal mood swings but is generally a joy to be around. She’s funny and confident, does well in school and is strong in her self worth. I have the joy of watching her sail through puberty, setting healthy boundaries and shrugging off what could be, what would have been for me potentially excruciating teenage drama. I’m happy she is enjoying her life and has many friends to share her joy with.
“Mom!” Elizabeth says in that sort of whiny tone, “do you have to wear that?”
I’m dressed in my pajamas, Carhartt farm jacket, a fur lined bomber hat, muck boots and work gloves.
“I have to go in to that dreadful freezer to pack meat orders after I drop you off at the bus Elizabeth.” I inform her.
“Well, can you stay in the car at the bus stop?” She pleads.
“Maybe…” I tease her.
As I pull the car around to park and wait for her bus I see the neighbor pull up in her Mercedes. I don’t like this woman. She’s one of those very materialistic women that is just dripping with FAKE. Fake smile, fake “Oh, so nice to see you.” Fake boobs etc. I see her and mutter, “I’m glad I don’t have her life!”
Elizabeth begins to laugh.
“What’s so funny?” I ask.
Laughing Elizabeth says “Mom, look at you, you are wearing old dirty mens farm clothes, you are driving an old beat up pick-up truck, driving from your falling apart, stinkbug infested house, there are chickens on the back porch and sheep in the front yard, you are sick and saying you are glad you are not her??? She is neatly dressed, in a brand new car, leaving her perfectly landscaped house, where the cleaning ladies are just pulling in, mind you…it’s just funny.”
Yeah I guess it is funny. “Bye Elizabeth. Have a great day!” Elizabeth kisses me on the cheek and doesn’t look back as she gets on the bus.
I wish I could have had her confidence when I was her age. I was always so afraid, alone and ashamed of everything.
I go to the freezer, pack the meat orders for the day then finish my office work. As I get dressed I feel a little better. Peeling off those “dirty mens farm clothes” and putting on my sexy ripped jeans, boots, soft simple cotton shirt and a little makeup, I feel a little more happy, confident like Elizabeth. I even feel taller, which I am of course because of the boots. I pack my gym bag and head to town to meet two of my girlfriends for lunch.
I got to the restaurant first. It’s Panera’s. These chains confuse me. There seems to be a fast paced professional-rushed kind of aspect that’s expected of this chains patrons. Everyone has their iphones and ipads and ear pieces in and is doing business of some sort while placing a hurried food order …they don’t even look at the menu…I got to the restaurant early on purpose so I could stand back and actually take a look at the menu this time, deciding what I wanted instead of just looking helplessly at the 18 year old girl behind the counter and saying “uhhh…just give me what ever the last person ordered.” too rushed and confused to think about what I might like to eat. I liked standing back against the wall watching the fast pace in front of me. I felt as if I were in another time zone. When Sam (Samantha) showed up I was ready! Theresa called and said she was running late so Sam and I ordered.
“I’ll have the mozzarella and tomato Panini with an apple.” I said with authority! Sam placed her order then ordered coffee. “Oh, I want coffee too.” I told the girl behind the counter. I think she rolled her eyes at me. “That will be another $1.75 please.” The girl behind the counter tells me in a monotone voice with a slight hint of irritation. I start digging around in the bottom of my purse for change. “Hang on..” I say “I know I have it here some where.” As I count out the pennies and nickels I realize I am once again holding up the line at this foreign fast-food place. I look at Sam. She is just standing there looking at me, three steps ahead of me. Being from New York city gives her this quick street smart and food chain savvy edge that I just don’t have…fresh off the farm as it were. Sam accepts me for who I am though, I imagine I probably frustrate her at times but I know it’s okay.
When Theresa shows up we start to chat about our lives. We get on the topic of catalog shopping. Teresa says “Don’t you just hate those Title Nine profiles?”
I think to myself Yes, I do…but why would you hate them?
“I know. Right?” Says Sam. “It’s like… ‘Mother of four, college professor, rock climber and marathon runner…keeps bees in her spare time’ Like who can compete with that?”
“I know!” I say. “Every time I read those profiles I think to myself ‘I suck’. I’m not sure of the marketing strategy there, I never want to buy anything after reading those profiles.” I say.
“Yeah,” Theresa chimes in. “Me either.”
“Wait, Theresa.” Sam says, “You are a bee keeper…and a social worker. You have a beautiful house, wonderful kids a successful marriage…you fit the profile!”
“Yeah, but you guys know the real story.” Theresa says with a sad sort of smile.
“So Kerri. What about your finances, your new opportunities of business. How’s all that going?” one of them asks me.
I tell them of my stress and anxiety. How things are just so foggy. “I know I can share this with you two and you won’t run to find a straight jacket. Lately, I have been feeling…” I start wondering if I should share this desperate feeling that I have been able to visualize and now sort of articulate. They are both patiently listening and waiting for me to continue. I decide to go on. “…lately I have this overwhelming urge to just lie down on the earth. I want the earth to just swallow me. Not in a violent earthquake sort of way but peacefully. I don’t even want to die. I just want to become...dirt…I want to be alive and be a part of it all but in the form of.. energy….I don’t know.” I start to loose the ability to put this feeling into words. “I think it’s just that am beginning to be ready to surrender. Surrender can be painful when we resist right? Do you have any suggestions?” I ask.
“Oohhh! I know!” Says Sam “You should be a stripper!”
“WHAT?” I ask, snapping out of my diatribe against the complexities of life and into a lighter more humorous state of mind.
“You have the charisma and the body…they make a lot of money you know.” Sam says with an enthusiasm that is adorably funny.
“Look ladies, I’m in great shape but I have given birth to four babies and nursed those four babies for a total of eight years. I look great with the help of Victoria’s Secret but naked I look like a model for the centerfold of the National Geographic magazine.” I tell them honestly.
Without skipping a beat Sam says “Then just strip in West Virginia!”
I love her edge and quick wit.
Talking with these ladies, these dear friends, I realize that despite my fur lined bomber hat and strange entrepreneurial history I am not unique in how I feel. I tend to, like many of us I suspect, compare my insides to others outsides. The reason the FAKE neighbor woman makes my skin crawl is not because of her but because I am comparing myself to her outward appearing perfection. Of course I seem to wear my insides on the outside for all the world to see…my get-up at the bus stop, my putting it all out there (here) in my writings…but actually, for me, putting it out there…putting myself out there in unfamiliar territory is why all these doors are opening up for me. I used to spend my life hiding. Even navigating the fast pace of a upper-class hot lunch spot used to be too intimidating a challenge to face. In the past I would have never opened up nor would I have listened to the likes of Theresa and Sam, women who in my book (my mind) have the whole pie of financial, emotional, spiritual, physical etc. in place and in balance. Sam and Teresa are awesome women with many of these things in place and in balance. I admire them very much and they have the same worries, fears, sense of humor (thank God) that I do.
Finally, in my forties I’m glad I am overcoming the fear that kept me alone, the fear which I now recognize as only my own thoughts not reality. I have made conscience a decision to give life and true friendship a try.
I must be doing something right today as is evident by my daughter’s happy, healthy and unique life.
You have such a beautiful heart, Kerri! Don't change a thing...ever.
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