I'm in the least lonely place, sitting alone, at a table for 10. It could be 180 calories, maybe 120, that I'm drinking. A girl with wild curls just sat down across from me. I never drank coffee until last year because its magical powers didn't find me until then. Calories and I aren't enemies, not friends, but I accept them for they don't haunt my days and nights like they have. Oh, the girl with curls has a friend sitting next to her now. I feel like a dinosaur when I'm around young people and their wireless everything...but, I don't understand how the music goes wireless-ly to my ears from my phone, so, I'll stick with my headphones until I do.
We went ahead and got married 12 days ago, my husband and I. Interestingly enough, I can't tolerate wearing contacts and my blue tortoise shell frames didn't go with my dress. So, I went without both and hoped I didn't run into our beautifully decorated arbor on my way to wedded bliss. All evening, I saw shadows of waving hands and happy faces (I think?) but unless someone walked directly up to me, I hadn't the slightest who they were. I wore a big, fat, half-sober smile all night just in case I missed a wave. We had the best time and didn't realize how many people loved us....enough to go all the way to Siloam Springs, Arkansas and eat our Giraffe cake and watch our first dachshund prelude my dad and I's entrance. I'm prone to creating and later illustrating anxiety when in situations surrounded by large number of folks. I mean, really, who isn't? I started panicking after making it down the isle because I instantly knew I couldn't talk to everyone. Oh, then, Mike's dinner spilled on his handsome new suit...before pictures.
Now, I have two more people sitting at my table for 10. The girl laughs and the guy is tapping his feet before he jumps up to retrieve his coffee--black, no sugar, he also wears a cardigan with elbow patches.
I pass by a stop light each day that grows grass around it in order for people to sit who are holding signs asking for help. It's next to a Hardees and Harps grocery store and my mom really loved both those places. Today, I made a U turn to go around this light so I could get a better look at the man holding up a broken piece of cardboard. It's really what makes me need to sit down and re-create the calmness I had before I saw him. . why I am sitting here writing.
"I have some ideas!" The girl says to the guy with the elbow patches on his cardigan. I had to turn my acoustic playlist up before I started over indulging in her big ideas and forget to tell you about mine. .
Five years ago, I was at a horribly rainy Razorback football game with some friends, scheming ways to get out of staying. Unbeknownst to me, at that time, I would find my escape when my mother called me, panic upon her. She needed to tell that as soon as I got home, I needed to call her so she could explain what had happened. Fast forward because the minor details involve me being angry, rude, and impatient with my mother.
John Mayer writes, sings, and plays most of my "favorite songs". One that I play loud in my ears (from my wired headphones) often is called, "In The Blood".
. . . How much of my mother has my mother left in me?
..........How much of my love will be insane to some degree?
. . . . . . . And what about this feeling that I'm never good enough?
.................Will it wash out in the water, or is it always in the blood
When my mom went to rehab few months or so after they released me from my 4 months of tortured "treatment" (eating disorders go to treatment drugs go to rehab, I dunno), she had this counselor who thought of me as satan (or so I decided). As I best recall, I went to visit mom on a Wednesday afternoon. As a real neat surprise (laughing), I was stopped at the door and told I had to meet with my mom's counselor before I could see her. It was summer time and I had on a giant t shirt and shorts because I didn't trust clothing labels and felt I was actually much larger than scales, other people, etc reported. Okay, I had been busy dreaming about the baked potato, spray butter, broccoli with ketchup crown I was going to pick apart and enjoy after this treacherous visit. But then, I had to push back this potato date further and still I struggle with other people getting in the way of my meal times (forgive me).
There's a man who frequents this place (as do I) and has all of his belongs next to him, pulling on a single roller bag. He just got a refill on his dragon fruit tea. I wonder when the last time was he had a solid conversation with another person? I hope it was earlier today. You know, we were created to fulfill relationships.... healthy ones, maybe even destructive ones. Where would you be without those bad ones that taught you who you were and what you stood for? I'd be so far gone, promise that. Fall apart, then you can come back as everything you needed.
I use both sides of my brain all day long (so do you) and have to categorize how I develop my ideas for written order. I get tangled up in my ideas I guess.
Sitting down in this crummy counselor's office was not on my calendar and I already knew I didn't care for this fella. My mom just "loved working with him" which meant she had manipulated him into believing she was "fine" and wasn't really an alcoholic. Which, is what happens when you are still comfortable with your addiction. I'll attest. I ended up letting this guy temporarily destroy me with his intervention of choice (ignorance, if you will). "If you could get control of yourself and start eating, your mother wouldn't be struggling with her depression as she is."
cue the tears, cue the body shaming, cue the destruction and take away that longed for baked potato date.
(depression, not alcoholism, not both)
When I got home and called my mom, after that rainy football game, she didn't answer. Not until the next day did I ever hear from her. You know why? She had been locked in her own damn shed by her erroneous boyfriend who had stolen her phone and most definitely haulted any contact with her to me. I found her in her back yard, drunk, exhausted, but happy to see me. I never got the full details of what happened on so many of these occasions with him until she had found a week of sobriety months later. We had to get out phone numbers changed and she got a restraining order (which did nothing for her) to keep this monster away from her and I. Weeks later, he showed up in his now forgotten red truck and I ran out of her house (in a towel, mad as hell) and he swiftly drove off. That's what he always did. He ran away and came back. Just like the alcohol. Always coming back in our lives.
The guy with the cardboard. He didn't have a red truck, only a sign and a look I'd like to forget. Even with my glasses on, I mistakenly saw him for the old, wretched boyfriend. My heart melted past my diaphragm and only started beating again when I was past Hardees and my thoughts were safe. My mom was safe. I was safe. What was I going to say to him if it was, indeed, the boyfriend. Would I start screaming, shouting, crying, having a complete and colorful meltdown? I don't know. Would I close my eyes (and stop my car) and pray for strength to protect my freedom (jail would not suit me) and find courage to move on? From my anger, resent, fear, sadness...the things no one welcomes.
Would I change the way I think if I wanted?
Would you?
I think so. I believe so.
It's only fair to figure out what holds us back and find out how to march throughout, over it, and beyond it.
Because as terribly sickening and hard as these things (so called, things) are....
you (and your thoughts)
are
completely
up
to
you
Now it's only the guy in the elbow-patched cardigan sitting nearby.
I'm feeling less likely to skip my dinner and more likely to add cheese to whatever I eat.
Thank God for destructiveness that creates space inside you for happiness (and potatoes),
Cortney Sisco (formerly Ellis)
P.S Courtney Garrett Photography out of Fayetteville, Arkansas took our wedding photos......and she's perfect.
:)
