As The Monsters Fade
I’m at a place where the monsters of my youth are fading. They can no longer walk or talk and somehow we are all returning to children. As I stood with my toes buried in the sand on a cold morning, I watched the marine layer swirl and pelicans glide low along the water looking for breakfast. I was processing. Someone who was cruel in my younger life is ill. I remember when we met. She was loud and bubbly and always wore her hair in little pig tales even though she was 39. She drank beer like a champ and as I grew to learn later, covered her immense pain with laughter.......and husbands and bible verses and more beer. Her definition of love is idolatry and forgiveness is a clean slate that means you can just say it all again, like dejavu. Her words cut like freshly sharpened knives. It is funny how as a girl I knew instinctively to be careful there, and yet her pain shaped my young adulthood.
Over time I broke free of the egg shell path and sharpened stones I walked on. I found strength as I grew into a woman, strength enough to say this is how I will be treated. It did not help our relationship, I just acquired a whole new set of names. It is amazing to see how many people are careless with their tongue or keyboard. You don’t really know all the vulnerable soft places that live inside another and you absolutely can not know if you will take them out with just one punch. You can’t know because you are not looking at an EKG of their soul. Is it so hard to let another person be right or acknowledge their goodness and celebrate their happiness? What do we really gain in forcing conformation to ourway of thinking? All I have ever seen come of that is loss.
So here I stand 34 years later thinking about the journey took and the fact that my larger than life villain is dissolving like the wicked witch of the west. I realize that while they say once you hit 50 people just start to go, what I did not connect with, is that they take their bullshit with them. There are so many imposed thought processes on a young woman. It’s important to ask if they belong to you. Often times we are 50 when we realize that we have spent years living into the expectations of a generation before us. Be good, be quiet, be married, be good to your husband, enjoy a little life, be quiet again. My greatest hope is that my children live beyond the limitations of my thought process.
As I stood on that beach I heard those old voices and I realized it was time to turn down the volume. I have a voice too and right now she is singing off key into the crashing waves. I feel the dancing start in my body. The little girl coming out of hiding once more. I realize now that my nemesis only worked with the tools she had in this life, but that does not earn her my forgiveness. Honestly I don’t think everyone is forgivable. Controversial? Maybe, but sometimes the best thing is to just dance on.
See here is the most important moment. The moment she and I both return to our childhood. Maybe this is our greatest intersection. A spot where we see each other clearly for who we were made to be. She in decline without her weapons and me picking up where I left off before we met, kids crossing paths. I wonder if we met here, free of the things we think we know of each other, we would dance together like girls. I wonder if we would be friends. We can’t carry the monster. It is a disservice to ourselves. If we are humble we can play in the light for a brief moment, when the best of me sees the best of you, dancing before forgiveness is even necessary. That could be our legacy.